Public Bill Committee

[Mr David Amess in the Chair]

Clause 19 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 20  - Right to reject

Stella Creasy: I beg to move amendment 13, in clause20,page11,line24,at end insert—
‘(a) within 30 days of agreeing that a refund is to be paid, and
(b) using the same payment method used in the original transfer.
‘(9A) Where the trader fails to ensure an entitled refund under subsection (9) is provided within 30 days, the consumer is entitled to seek damages from the trader commensurate with the impact of any loss caused by this delay, unless the consumer has decided to waive this right to a refund within this timeframe.’.

David Amess: With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:
Amendment 14, in clause20,page11,line27,after ‘transferred’, insert
‘within 30 days of agreeing that a refund is to be provided’.
Amendment 15, in clause20,page11,line27,at end insert—
‘(10A) Where a trader fails to ensure an entitled transfer under subsection (10) is provided within 30 days the consumer is entitled to seek damages from the trader commensurate with the impact of any loss caused by this delay.
(10B) Damages shall not be awarded if—
(a) the consumer has decided to waive this right to a return of whatever was transferred within this timeframe, or;
(b) such a timeframe could not be considered reasonable given the transfer in question.’.
Amendment 16, in clause20,page11,line31,after ‘transferred’, insert
‘within 30 days of agreeing that a refund is to be provided.
‘(11A) Where a trader fails to ensure an entitled transfer under subsection (11) is provided within 30 days the consumer is entitled to seek damages from the trader commensurate with the impact of any loss of income from this delay on them.
(11B) Damages shall not be awarded if—
(a) the consumer has decided to waive this right to a return of whatever was transferred within this timeframe, or;
(b) such a timeframe could not be considered reasonable given the transfer in question.’.
Amendment 17, in clause20,page11,line34,at end insert—
‘(12A) Any refund under subsection (12) shall be paid—
(a) within 30 days of agreeing that such a refund is to be provided, and
(b) using the same format for payment used in the original transfer for which they are receiving the refund.
(12B) Where the trader fails to ensure an entitled refund under subsection (12) is provided within 30 days the consumer is entitled to seek damages from the trader commensurate with the impact of any loss caused by this delay.
(12C) Damages shall not be awarded if—
(a) the consumer has decided to waive this right to a return of whatever was transferred within this timeframe, or
(b) such a timeframe could not be considered reasonable given the transfer in question.’.
Amendment 18, in clause20,page11,line37,at end insert—
‘(13A) Any refund under subsection (13) shall be paid—
(a) within 30 days of agreeing that such a refund is to be provided, and
(b) using the same format for payment used in the original transfer for which they are receiving the refund.
(13B) Where a trader fails to ensure an entitled refund under subsection (13) is provided within 30 days the consumer is entitled to seek damages from the trader commensurate with the impact of any loss caused by this delay on them, unless the consumer has decided to waive this right to a return of whatever was transferred within this timeframe.’.
Amendment 24, in clause24,page14,line39,after ‘amount’, insert ‘, to be paid—
(i) within 30 days of agreeing that a refund is to be paid, and
(ii) using the same payment method used in the original transfer for which they are receiving the refund.
‘(1A) Where the trader fails to ensure this refund is provided within this timeframe the consumer is entitled to seek damages from the trader commensurate with the impact of any loss caused by this delay, unless the consumer has decided to waive this right to a refund within this timeframe.’.
Amendment 36, in clause45,page28,line8,at end insert—
‘(2A) The consumer is entitled to this refund within 30 days of agreeing that a refund is to be paid using the same payment format used to purchase the digital content for which they are receiving the refund.
(2B) Where the trader fails to ensure this refund is provided within this timeframe the consumer is entitled to seek damages from the trader commensurate with the impact of any loss of income from this delay on them unless the consumer has decided to waive this right to a refund within this timeframe.’.
Amendment 37, in clause46,page28,line22,at end insert—
‘(2A) The consumer is entitled to this payment within 30 days of agreeing that a payment is to be made using the same payment method used to purchase the digital content for which they are receiving the payment.
(2B) Where the trader fails to ensure this payment is provided within this timeframe the consumer is entitled to seek damages from the trader commensurate with the impact of any loss of income from this delay on them unless the consumer has decided to waive this right to a payment within this timeframe.’.

Stella Creasy: Welcome, Mr Amess. This morning was like a therapy session for many of us who have experienced frustrations in our consumer practice.

Brooks Newmark: Speak for yourself.

Stella Creasy: I certainly felt I got a lot out of getting it off my chest, and I am sure that this afternoon will be no different. I hope, Mr Amess, that you will enjoy hearing our first-hand experiences of some of the problems that consumers have. It is with that in mind that we have tabled the amendments.
Clause 20 concerns the right to reject. A point for all of us to agree on is that if someone has been sold something faulty, they ought to be able to reject it and say, “It is not good enough, I want my money back”. The amendments say that it is an absolute right to be able to reject something and say, “It is not good enough, it has broken the terms and conditions by which I bought it, it is not satisfactory or fit for purpose, I would like my money back and I should not have to wait to get it”. We would hope that that is a simple proposition for the Committee.
The clause sets out a number of conditions under which a person could get their money back and reject a good. Our amendments mirror those various conditions. For example, when somebody has paid for something outright, we set out the point at which they should get their money back. When they have paid for something via an exchange, we set out what they might get back in that instance. We also provide for what happens when somebody has paid for part of an agreement through another form of payment—for example, if they have paid for something as part of a contract but want to reject the whole contract. The amendments cover a range of activities.
The Government have placed great store on making consumer rights simple in the Bill and making them really clear for people to remember. I am sorry, Mr Amess, that you missed our conversation this morning about remedies. I think that you were here for the sitting when we talked about point-of-sale information. It seems to us that the Government’s simple proposition is that people should be able to remember all their rights, and therefore they do not need to be told them at the point at which they might want to exercise them. In order for them to be memorable, they clearly have to be consistent. The Bill sets out a 30-day limit in which someone can exercise their short-term right to reject.
Let us return to our jumper with a hole in it. If we identify that there is a hole, we have 30 days to return it. That is a fairly simple rule. Even I could remember that, I think. We are trying, through our amendments, to ensure that people do not have to wait an unspecified to time to get their money back. We do not think that is fair, especially in a day and age when people can spend money instantaneously. All of us rue the times, perhaps late at night, when we have been on Amazon, seen 1-Click and suddenly found that we have bought something. Instantaneously, that money has gone from our accounts. We think that just as quickly as money can be taken from us by a trader, it should be returned.
There are some instances in which there might be delays in money coming back to people. We heard in the evidence given to us by the British Retail Consortium, which, I stress, said it was happy with the idea of a 30-day period for money to be refunded, that there might be issues to do with the bank payment system. Those of us who have ever used a bank payment system to pay credit cards, for example, will know that that can be very quick. The money can definitely be gone quickly, so it is possible to do. We do not see why consumers should have such clear short-term rights to reject things but such undefined rights about getting their own money back.
The amendments are about ensuring, in all the different instances in which somebody might exercise the right to reject, that they are able to recoup their money in a time period that is similarly easy to remember. If someone was not getting their money back, they would have a right to go to the trader and say, “Hang on a minute, if you can take the money so quickly, you should be able to return it.”

Stephen Doughty: My hon. Friend raises a crucial point that many of my constituents have raised with me recently, particularly the issue of direct debit payments for products and the slow speed at which payment is returned. The money is quickly taken out of accounts—large amounts over a number of months—but often for products that are not delivered, or not delivered to the customer’s satisfaction. I experienced that recently with EE, which took ages to pay me back for a product that was not working and was not satisfactory.

Stella Creasy: My hon. Friend makes the case very well. It does not make sense to us in this day and age, especially when people pay so quickly online, that it can take so long for money to be returned to people. That can have serious consequences for people who might have paid a substantial sum of money for a good. If they have to wait several months for their money back while it is processed, as I have waited for a refund in the past, that can be a financial disadvantage to them.
The amendment takes the spirit of the Bill—making consumer rights simple—and applies that simplicity to the concept of a refund. We wanted to test that in the evidence sessions. As I have already said, the British Retail Consortium said that it was happy with the idea. The Federation of Small Businesses said:
“I think we have no problem at all with the 30-day limit. As we have said before, it should not be causing any problems at all to our members. Most of our members would in any case try to keep their customers happy in as short a time as possible. The last thing we want is for consumers to have a bad experience, whether it is with tradesmen, retailers or any other sector. So we do not see too much of a problem with that 30-day period.”––[Official Report, Consumer Rights Public Bill Committee, 11 February 2014; c. 33, Q69.]
So we should all expect our money back much sooner than 30 days, but because of the similarities and the parallels with other rights in the Bill, it makes sense to provide that time frame and to recognise that there might be some delays that account for one or two weeks of processing, if an accounts department has to be involved or if paperwork has to be involved—perish the thought; how very 20th century. Nevertheless, 30 days seems a fair amount of time for someone to remember that they are entitled to their money back. We should have the confidence to put that time frame into the Bill and make it clear to people that if for any reason a trader is delaying refunding them, they have a right of redress. They have a right to say, “I should have compensation, because of the consequences for me of not getting my money back within a month.”
The various amendments reflect the different scenarios in which there is a refund entitlement under the Bill. We have tried to accommodate different types of refunds. For example, someone might be returning a car. A part exchange on a car might be an instance where it takes longer to return something, compared with an instantaneous bank credit, which we all know can be done, although it often is not done. We nevertheless think that even in such scenarios, 30 days is still a reasonable amount of time to wait.
We have included a proviso in some of the amendments that a trader and a consumer can waive the 30-day limit if there is a particular reason why it might take a long time to recoup a good or a payment, so there is some flexibility in the amendments. Without them, we are concerned that consumers might come to know and indeed love the idea that they have 30 days to return something, but be extremely confused about how long they must wait for the return of their own cash. By accepting the amendments, the Committee can take that spirit of simplicity and apply it across the piece. Even if consumers are not necessarily provided with the full details of their rights or remedies at the point of sale or the point of complaint, 30 is a number that will stick in their heads.
 Fiona O'Donnell (East Lothian) (Lab) rose—

David Amess: I call the Minister.
 Fiona O'Donnell  rose—

David Amess: I am sorry. I apologise, Minister. I did not see the hon. Lady rising.

Fiona O'Donnell: My arthritic knees are playing havoc with my ability to contribute to the debate. You are definitely not responsible for those, Mr Amess. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to contribute to the debate, and I thank the Minister as well for understanding.
I want to reinforce what my hon. Friend the Member for Walthamstow said. The clearer we make consumer rights, the easier it will be for people to exercise them. On the other side of the contract, it is important that there is clarity for traders as well, so that they understand their responsibilities. I expect all of us will have personal experiences that relate to the Bill, and although none of us would abuse your time, Mr Amess, or the Committee’s by using this as a therapy session, as it was called earlier, many of us have had the experience of returning faulty goods and then having to wait an inordinate time before the money is refunded. When the faulty goods are essential items such as white goods, that can cause real inconvenience for people who do not have the resources to replace the product in the meantime.
Will the Minister indicate what the consumer’s rights will be when there is a credit agreement in place on an item? If someone has entered into a credit agreement with the provider of the goods, how will that be handled under the Bill? It is disappointing that at various points, the Minister seems to have left it to guidance to spell out consumers’ exact rights. We already have many experiences from this Parliament of when flexibility in guidance has meant that consumers’ rights are not enforced.

Andrew McDonald: Does my hon. Friend agree that the amendments are mercifully simple? They have also met with the approval of a range of bodies, including Citizens Advice, the British Retail Consortium and the Federation of Small Businesses, so there appears to be an attraction to the simple approach of a 30-day payback period, which can be readily understood. Does she agree that that is to be welcomed?

Fiona O'Donnell: Indeed it is, and I hope that the Minister will welcome it to give us broad consensus about the roles that people play in the engagement between suppliers and consumers. There is a lot of acceptance that we can simplify the rights of the consumer and those of the person providing the goods or service, so that everyone is absolutely clear about what their rights are. Reading the explanatory notes showed me that I have not been aware of my consumer rights in the past and have missed several opportunities to exercise them. We want to avoid that situation, and as my hon. Friend says, the 30-day rule is a simple concept for people to grasp. Within it, there needs to be follow-up to ensure that people are refunded quickly, so that they can choose where to take their custom.
Will the Minister provide some clarification on when exactly there is a right to a full refund and when it is reasonable to expect the person supplying the goods or service to make good through repair? I am sure that many of us get a gut instinct sometimes, such as when the washing machine breaks down on day three—we think, “This machine is never going to work. I’m not going to trust it.” Weeks and weeks of repairs and waiting for parts do not result in the item performing in the way it was described, or looking as it did in the showroom. At what point does the consumer have the right to demand a refund, and what is reasonable?
I remember having such an experience when my four children were young. The washing machine broke down, and I was constantly told that I had to wait for repairs. In the meantime, I was trying to keep my children in clean clothes, but clothes were being damaged. What are people’s rights, and how will they be communicated to people? Do not the amendments provide the Minister with a great opportunity to make the message that is sent to consumers clear and simple, so that they can exercise their rights? I look forward to her response.
Thank you again for calling me, Mr Amess—I will keep my knees moving for the rest of our proceedings.

Jennifer Willott: Clearly, it is extremely important that consumers get their money back, or some compensation, if they exercise the right to reject something. An important part of the process under the Bill is that people can have confidence and faith that that will happen. To answer the point made by the hon. Member for—

Fiona O'Donnell: East Lothian.

Jennifer Willott: Thank you. There are a lot of Members on the Committee whose constituencies have “East” in their name.
A consumer will be eligible for a full refund if they reject a purchase in the first 30 days. Regarding the issue of having to go through repairs, the Bill lays out clearly that consumers will have the right to one repair. If the goods still break down or are still not working after that, the consumer will be able to reject them.
I complete understand the hon. Lady’s point about washing machines, children and vast quantities of dirty clothes. Clearly, it is extremely frustrating for people if they have to go through an entire cycle over and over again—getting things fixed, seeing them break down and having to wait again. One of the problems with the current law is that it is not clear how many times a consumer has to put up with attempting to get something repaired before they can finally get their money back.
One of the strengths of the Bill is that it stipulates that there is only one chance to get the goods repaired. If the goods still do not work or break down again, the consumer will have, at that point, the right to reject them and get a refund. Normally, within the first six months, that will be a 100% refund. Therefore, if the goods break down and the consumer has had them repaired, but they break down again within the first six months, the consumer will normally get a full refund. It is important that people know that, and that is one of the ways in which the Bill will introduce clarity.
Where a consumer exercises those rights, the Bill provides that the trader has a duty to give the consumer a refund—either money or something else transferred to the trader—for those faulty goods.

Andrew McDonald: I want to ask the Minister for some clarification. I have not read this particular part of the Bill thoroughly enough, but I think the interpretation must be that we will have a weakened position compared with what we have now under the Sale of Goods Act 1979. I seem to recall that there is currently no obligation currently to entertain one attempted repair. The statutory right under the 1979 Act is the ability to reject the goods outright. Will that still be the position under the proposal before us now?

Jennifer Willott: The 1979 Act will still apply, so consumers can pursue their rights either under that Act or under the Bill. However, for an awful lot of people, if they have purchased something and it has broken down, they want it to be fixed so that it will work. If someone has paid for a washing machine, it is much simpler for people to get it fixed and carry on using it, rather than having to reject it and going to find another one. Clearly, there will be circumstances—for example, if there is regular flooding in the kitchen or the machine trashes someone’s clothes—in which a consumer may want to get a new machine, but in many cases, getting it repaired once will be preferable.

Andrew McDonald: Are we not running the risk of confusing the consumer? On the one hand, they can say, “I have something that does not function as it should. Take it away. I want my money back. I am unhappy with that. That is my right under the Sale of Goods Act.” On the other hand, under this Bill, the trader might say to the consumer, “Oh no, you have to accept at least one opportunity for repair.” Does that not muddle the position for both the trader and the consumer?

Jennifer Willott: I apologise—I was wrong. The Bill will replace the 1979 Act for trader-consumer relationships. The right to reject is transposed from the 1979 Act to the Bill, but with the 30-day limit, which is what I think is currently in the 1979 Act.
At the moment, there is no limit to the number of repairs that a consumer has to accept before it is clear that they can finally reject the goods. What we are doing, following the Law Commission’s recommendation, is introducing the right to reject after one failed repair. It is much simpler for people to understand that they can reject an item at that point.

Fiona O'Donnell: Continuing with the laundry day metaphors, I do not want to get the Minister in a spin, but I am now confused as to where consumers’ rights sit in the event of faulty goods. Do they have, as the Minister initially specified, a right to reject the item as faulty, as it is not performing, or do they have to allow the trader to attempt one repair? Within what time frame does that repair have to be carried out?

Jennifer Willott: The consumer has the right to reject within 30 days across the board, but they have the right to accept one repair—

Stephen McPartland: Will the Minister confirm that the consumer rights now being put forward do not take away any consumer rights, but rather add to them, so all the existing consumer rights are still there?

Jennifer Willott: Yes, there will still be the short-term right to reject, which is within 30 days. If someone buys something that causes problems right from the beginning, there is the right to reject within 30 days. At that point, there is the right to one attempt to repair or replace, and if that does not work, there is also the right to a refund. It is fairly simple, although it may not appear to be, having just had this conversation. Consumers do have a simple set of rights.

Andrew McDonald: For clarity and to help the Minister, is there an unqualified right to reject the goods and demand a refund within 30 days, but beyond that, an opportunity to repair once?

Jennifer Willott: Yes, the hon. Gentleman puts it very neatly. I could not have put it better myself.

Fiona O'Donnell: Does the person who has provided the goods have a duty to inform the consumer of their rights, so that they understand that within the first 30 days they do not have to accept a repair and can reject the goods at that point?

Jennifer Willott: That goes back to our previous debate about how we ensure that both businesses and consumers have that information. Clearly, it will be critical that consumers have access to that information so that they know what their rights are.
With regard to a refund, the arguments on whether or not to have a strict time limit are finely balanced. The Government believe that the potential disadvantages of introducing a time limit outweigh the benefits that the change could bring, and I will explain why. I appreciate that on the face of it the issue could seem clear cut, but there are arguments on both sides. I know that my predecessor, my hon. Friend the Member for East Dunbartonshire (Jo Swinson), considered this aspect of the Bill closely.
We need first to consider the scale of the problem. I am aware that some consumer organisations have given anecdotal evidence of delays in obtaining refunds, as we heard during our evidence sessions, but I have not seen any evidence that that is a significant area of consumer detriment. For example, the 2012 consumer detriment survey used interviews with more than 10,000 people to identify the biggest problems consumers faced, and delayed refunds did not feature in the key areas where consumers were experiencing problems.
In the evidence provided to this Committee, the business representatives were slightly confused about why this was being raised as a priority. The British Retail Consortium spokesman said:
“Can I question the question? Has an issue been raised on the time it takes for refunds?”––[Official Report, Consumer Rights Public Bill Committee, 11 February 2014; c. 34, Q72.]
Contrary to the suggestion by the hon. Member for Walthamstow, when the spokesmen from the British Retail Consortium and the Federation of Small Businesses said that they were happy with the 30-day time limit, they were talking about the 30-day right to reject goods, not about introducing a 30-day time limit on refunds. There appeared to be confusion about whether it was an issue, and I have not seen any evidence that it is a big problem.
Clearly it is not the case that delayed refunds never happen. We have heard anecdotal evidence, and a number of members of the Committee have said that it is a problem that they have experienced, but the small number of cases that we have seen tend to involve businesses deliberately avoiding making a payment. In the small number of cases of shoddy practice, businesses will use any excuse not to pay back. A time limit will not solve that; they will just argue about something else instead—whether there is a fault or how much the refund should be, for example. In those instances, enforcement is the only way to ensure compliance, rather than putting a time limit in the Bill. Good business will follow good business practice. Without a time limit to refund, the vast majority of businesses will refund as soon as possible. We heard that in the evidence from the business organisations on the first Committee day. It is beneficial for them to do so, reputationally as well as competitively.

Stephen Doughty: I appreciate that the Minister is referring to a survey, but I have seen numerous examples in my casework recently and have experienced such issues myself. Has she not seen them in her casework? Perhaps other hon. Members have examples they can share. The problem seems to be growing and it causes people a lot of stress. Sometimes people simply accept delays and do not make much fuss because they do not realise what their rights to receive a quick refund are.

Jennifer Willott: I do not doubt for a second that delayed refunds happen. It clearly happened to the hon. Gentleman. We have seen it across the board, but the evidence for it is anecdotal rather than measureable. When the survey was done, it did not identify such delays as a large-scale problem. It was not one of the key consumer detriment issues that people raised. I am not denying that it happens; it clearly does.

Andrew McDonald: The Minister talks about the scale of problem. Citizens Advice reported, admittedly on 27 December 2012, that shoppers had been left almost £3 billion out of pocket because they faced lengthy delays for refunds and the replacement of faulty goods. I suggest that the problem might not be on the small scale that she suggests; it might be more significant than we think.

Jennifer Willott: All I can base my remarks on is the survey of 10,000 consumers, which did not identify such delays as a key consumer detriment issue. I do not deny for a second that they happen; they clearly do. The hon. Member for Cardiff South and Penarth made clear that it happened to him. It is clear from the evidence from consumer groups and, I am sure, MPs’ casework that it happens, but the issue is finely balanced. Such delays do happen, but I will come in a moment to what would happen if we introduced a time limit.

Stella Creasy: Far be it from me to express a note of caution, but did the survey to which the Minister keeps referring ask consumers about delays in securing refunds? After all, there is always a difference between whether the question was asked and whether the issue was raised.

Jennifer Willott: My understanding is that, yes, it did ask that. Evidence we were given by the CBI and the FSB shows that good businesses want to maintain their reputation and act competitively. For many of them, part of that is offering extremely good customer service and ensuring they offer refunds as quickly as possible. I appreciate the argument that we could at least set a backstop to limit an area that unscrupulous traders might use to avoid refunds, but we need to gauge that against the potential disadvantages. By setting a limit, there is the real danger that it could become the default, with businesses being legally able to hang on to a customer’s money and their not receiving a refund until day 30, which would of course be to the detriment of the customer. The best businesses will certainly want to ensure that payment is processed as quickly as possible, to provide good customer service and keep people coming back. I fear that a minority might feel entitled to operate to a slower deadline if they were able to delay payment to day 30.

Andrew McDonald: Is not the opposite true? We have good practitioners on our high streets that offer to refund money immediately. There has been no statutory obligation on them to do so, but they differentiate themselves by offering that excellent service. I am not sure that setting a backstop and a limit would be to the consumers’ detriment. Good practice will always come to the surface. We are talking about where good practice does not happen.

Jennifer Willott: That is certainly true. There are businesses that pride themselves, as I said, on their customer service, which is one of the things they use to mark themselves out from their competition, but we are looking at traders across the whole economy. We are not looking just at high street shops, where it may be much easier to process a refund very quickly. We are talking about services and much more complicated purchases that often take place at a distance, and that could involve an international dimension as well. We are looking at the whole range, which constitutes quite a wide variety.

Brooks Newmark: Again, I am sympathetic to what the Opposition have been saying, but this is part of a much wider problem, in that the weakest point in the chain unfortunately becomes the consumer, because the suppliers that we have bought our goods from are also being squeezed and sometimes are not paid for 60, 90 or even 100 days. At the end of the day, the consumer is the easiest to squeeze.

Jennifer Willott: That is certainly true and it is one reason why I am concerned that setting a time limit in the legislation could create knock-on difficulties where refunds are delayed by third parties, such as through banking mistakes or in transfers that these people cannot control, as my hon. Friend the Member for Braintree said, as part of the chain.
The amendments would allow the consumer, where the trader fails to refund them within 30 days, to seek damages from the trader proportionate to any loss that the delay causes them, but I do not believe that that is necessary. I will come on to that. The amendments are also designed to make it a legal requirement for the trader to refund a payment, whether that was monetary or some other transfer, by the original format of payment used to obtain the goods or digital content. If the consumer has paid by debit card, the trader is entitled to offer to make the refund to the debit card used to make the purchase. However, alternative methods of refund—for example, cheque or cash—can be offered and in fact may be requested by the customer.
Clearly, if there are security issues, other payment options might be more appropriate. Cheques may or may not be a safer option than handing over large amounts of cash, for example, depending on the circumstances. I believe that it is important not to mandate a particular approach that may not be convenient for the consumer or may not be as secure. For example, a consumer may pay by cheque at a shop premises, but send back faulty goods by post. It may be less secure for the trader then to send a cheque back by post, rather than to do an electronic transfer, if the consumer cannot visit the shop premises. It would also be a slower means of transferring the money back if a cheque was sent by post. Therefore, ensuring flexibility is important.
The Bill already protects the consumer from being fobbed off with store vouchers or a credit note when returning faulty goods where they have paid with money; that would not normally be acceptable. We do not want to alter those arrangements: they provide flexibility and convenience for consumers and businesses alike.
Clause 46 protects consumers where digital content damages their device or other digital content. I will not go into the detail of that clause now, because we will come to it later, but it is intended to cover contracts where the consumer may not have paid any money to the trader who is at fault. It is intended to cover damage to the consumer’s device or digital content caused by the trader’s digital content. There may not even have been a payment method and, where there is, depending on the scale of the damage, it may not be appropriate to refund the payment method with the compensation payment. The consumer may not want that money going on to their credit card or debit card. They may want it to go into a separate account if what has been damaged is a different item. By reducing the options, we would take away flexibility and thus limit the choice that the consumer and the trader have.

Fiona O'Donnell: The Minister may be about to address this question. Where a consumer has entered into a credit agreement, would any interest that had been paid in the first 30 days also be refunded?

Jennifer Willott: I will get clarification on that point for the hon. Lady. I understand that, if there is a credit agreement and a loan has been taken out for the faulty product, there would be joint liability for that good under the consumer credit agreement, so the consumer could also look to the creditor for protection. For example, if the good was bought with a credit card, the consumer would have additional protection for that purchase. However, I will come back to the hon. Lady with the specific answer to her question.
The Bill as it stands gives consumers scope to get a refund if they are entitled to that—if their statutory rights are breached—but also to claim damages as an alternative to exercising their right to reject. Consumers can claim damages in addition to exercising the right to reject, or any other rights to money back, if they have suffered additional loss. Although consumers cannot claim twice for the same loss, if they have suffered other loss, they can claim damages for that.
I believe that the Bill offers the right amount of flexibility and choice for the consumer without limiting the time and manner in which a trader should refund a consumer.

Sheila Gilmore: The position that the Minister outlines is that the best organisations will want to give a refund as soon as possible. Given that consumer law often deals with those who do not comply, surely it is a good thing to include the time limit—the good retailers will presumably want to do even better than that.

Jennifer Willott: I agree that the best businesses—those that pride themselves on their customer service and so on—will continue to act as speedily as possible. However, our concern is that there could be several unintended consequences. For example, by setting a 30-day limit, we could end up with companies that have slightly less proactive customer services taking the longest time. Other issues may affect a business’s ability to make a speedy refund, particularly if international trade is going on or there is a long supply chain, which may make it more challenging.
I hope that it is okay if I write to the hon. Member for East Lothian to clarify her point about the credit agreement and the interest paid.

Stephen Doughty: I am still struggling with the idea that a time limit will encourage some businesses to take longer. Certainly, as a consumer, given the challenge I had with EE in getting a refund, I would have liked to know that there was a backstop power pushing the company to deliver it to me in 30 days. I consider 30 days a reasonable amount of time for it to pay money back to me. If it can do it quicker, brilliant, but 30 days is reasonable. It actually took a lot longer and required multiple phone calls. There was no sense that there was any pressure on the company to give that money back to me quickly.

Jennifer Willott: As I said to the hon. Member for Middlesbrough, we are considering a complicated subject. The amendments cover pretty much all goods, all services, all digital content in a complex marketplace. A time limit may be completely appropriate for getting a payment back on a mobile phone bill, whereby the company takes the money instantly and could probably give it back fairly quickly, but in other cases, the system is a great deal more bureaucratic, requires more checking and is much more complicated. Thirty days could be complex—for example, when does the period start and when does it finish? The time limit could create unintended consequences and that concerns me.
We have examined the matter closely and I have huge sympathy with the hon. Gentleman’s point.

Stephen Doughty: Will the Minister give us some concrete examples of the complex scenarios that she mentions? That would help me understand her points a bit better. In a world where transactions can occur so quickly and where banking technology has moved on so much in the past few years, I do not understand the complexities to which she refers, apart from in the small number of very complicated international transactions for which fraud and security checks have to be done.

Jennifer Willott: There will be cases in which, for example, a shop or business is part of a larger organisation and there has to be approval at various points up the scale so something cannot just be refunded in the local shop; the refund has to go back to the head office so that it can be agreed and processed. It is sometimes easy to think from our personal experience of things such as mobile phone companies or taking a jumper with a hole in it back to a local shop, but the amendments address a much broader range that may be much more complex. As I have said, a case might involve a chain of approval before something can happen.

Andrew McDonald: Is that not the nub of the matter? We are saying that there are circumstances in which someone should be expected to wait more than 30 days. I just asked the Minister to ponder on that. She said that the refund might have to be kicked up the chain, but the principle that underpins all our consumer legislation going back decades is that the customer’s relationship is with the retailer they have dealt with. It is not a question of saying, “Excuse me, but I have to deal with manufacturers and a supplier up the chain.” The customer can reply, “I really don’t care about that. I am dealing with you. I have given you my money on my credit card or debit card, and I have rejected the goods because they are not fit for purpose. I want my money back, and I want it back right now.” It is not unreasonable for someone to say that.

Jennifer Willott: The hon. Gentleman is right that the relationship is with the trader. I am not necessarily saying that there has to be approval up the supply chain, but if someone purchases, say, a sofa from a big national retailer, the shop itself might not necessarily be able to process a refund immediately. In practice, the consumer is entitled to a refund as soon as the right to reject the goods is exercised. Any unreasonable delay will be a breach of the trader’s responsibilities under the Bill. Most refunds will be made as soon as possible, and it is clear from the evidence we received from the business organisations that most, if not all, of their members want to process refunds as soon as possible. One way in which businesses make themselves competitive in the marketplace is by ensuring that their customers are happy by giving them the treatment that they feel they deserve so that they go back for more. The overwhelming majority of businesses do not need to be told that it has to be 30 days, because they will be processing the refund far quicker than that. The issue I have laid out is that, if we have the backstop position of 30 days, the onus is taken off the trader to give the refund as quickly as possible, which changes the balance between the consumer and the trader.

Fiona O'Donnell: I am currently trying to support local businesses in my constituency. I am trying to get a refund from one business and the owner tells me that he cannot refund me because a large wholesaler has not yet refunded him. Has the Minister considered giving the same rights to small businesses so that we can try to break the chain?

Jennifer Willott: The hon. Lady is trying to entice me into reopening the debate that we had on our first day. I am sure that the issue of the business-to-business relationship, rather than the business-to-consumer relationship, will come back, and we will consider it in response to the FSB’s report, but it is not one for the Bill.
I hope I have answered Members’ queries, and therefore ask the hon. Member for Walthamstow to withdraw her amendment.

Stella Creasy: This has been an interesting debate that has shown precisely why we need to simplify consumer rights legislation. There is no clarity on consumer rights or on what consumers can reasonably expect. It is worth considering some of the things that have been said in response to that, particularly by the Minister.
I defer to my hon. Friend the Member for East Lothian, who explicitly asked all the organisations that gave evidence to the Committee about the 30-day issue. When the Minister suggests that the organisations’ agreement that it is not a problem had nothing to do with the request by my hon. Friend, she is not doing justice to the transcript or to what my hon. Friend actually asked. As we have heard today, my hon. Friend feels very strongly about that, as we all do.

Fiona O'Donnell: It might help my hon. Friend if I cast my mind back. My frustration was that the person giving evidence did not even seem able to grasp the concept that there would be a delay, and thought that it was simply about banks and was not businesses’ fault. They did not realise that there are some businesses out there that deliberately do not process refunds as quickly as they could or should, especially when their own cash flow is causing concerns.

Stella Creasy: My hon. Friend comes to the nub of this: is this a Bill about rights for consumers? If it is, our concern should be for the consumer who is left hanging because of decisions made by the trader that they are dealing with. It seems bizarre to specify time limits in parts of the Bill but not in others, given what the Minister has said about the importance of flexibility.
We know that time limits are the most easily understood and clearest provision. We have all said today that 30 days is a reasonable amount of time for someone to expect to get their money back; the Minister agrees with that. Waiting for longer than a month can cause considerable inconvenience. If it is a substantial purchase such as the sofa that we have discussed, it could be month’s wages for somebody. It could be a huge amount of money for them to be waiting to have refunded. It seems rather odd to the Opposition that the Bill does not say that, in that instance, we must make sure that the consumer has protection from start to finish. Woe betide someone whose sofa turns out not to be the perfect accoutrement to their house that they dreamed that it was going to be.
I do not think that the Minster’s logic stacks up. She said that there should not be a problem, because that was what the people who gave evidence said. However, where there is a problem, it is because traders are seeking to supersede and undermine someone’s rights through what the Minister called shoddy practice. That seems to me to be exactly the point at which we should step in to say “Hold up, this is shoddy practice—let’s define a time period so that they cannot claim that this is reasonable.” We should say that if a trader is doing that, the consumer has rights. Indeed, if they are not paid back within 30 days and it has an impact on their financial position, they should be compensated for that in addition to the compensation that they might get for a faulty good.

Stephen McPartland: rose—

Fiona O'Donnell: rose—

Stella Creasy: I can see that the subject has aroused passions on both sides, and in the spirit of bipartisanship I give way to the hon. Member for Stevenage first.

Stephen McPartland: My understanding of amendment 13 is that the final part of it suggests that it applies unless consumers waive their rights. My concern is that unscrupulous traders would say that a person had waived their rights, and traders who pay within 30 days would say that they had not. Additionally, organisations such as Amazon and iTunes would say that, as part of their terms and conditions, a person has waived their rights.

Stella Creasy: As the hon. Gentleman will see, the amendment very clearly states that it would be up to the consumer to decide to do that. We think that that would cover the small set of instances—I note that the Minister struggled to find ones that would fit this test—where there might be some reason for a delay in repayment beyond 30 days. Let us be clear that we are not talking about delays in the delivery of a good, or even delays in repairs, such as for the sofa that is so perfect and specialist that the craftsman has to come from Italy to fix the legs. We are talking about cash—the payment that has been made and that a trader is now holding because a good has been paid for. It does not seem unreasonable to us to say that a person should be able to recoup that within 30 days.

Andrew McDonald: Can my hon. Friend imagine any circumstance where it has been established that the goods are defective, that they have been rejected and that the contract is at an end? In the example that the Minister gave of the sofa that had the hidden tear, that is absolutely not acceptable, so it would go back. Are there any circumstances in which a consumer should be obliged to wait more than 30 days? As my hon. Friend rightly said, the sum could be up to a month’s wages. Is that not absolutely unacceptable?

Stella Creasy: I agree with my hon. Friend. We deliberately did not talk about the point at which these rights will be exercised, because that appears in later clauses. Clause 24 covers those rights and, if I read it rightly—the Minister may correct me—this final right to reject does not come in until the goods have been recovered. So it is not even as though there were a delay in collecting the faulty sofa, which might be a reason why it would take longer than 30 days to pay somebody back, as the company would have to ascertain that it had the sofa back. There does not seem to be any reason why we should not create the back-stop that we suggest.
The Minister’s logic—that if we create that back-stop, companies will delay their repayments until they reach the limit—does not accord with our recognition in earlier conversations that good businesses will want to get people’s money back to them as quickly as possible because, frankly, that will make them more likely to spend money with them again. If a person has had a good experience and good customer service, they will probably go back to Amazon or John Lewis. If they have had a bad experience, such as a lengthy delay in getting their money, they will probably think twice about shopping with them. There is every incentive for traders to get that stuff right first time. The amendment would deal with the shoddy practices rather than accepting that shoddy practices will always take place.

Fiona O'Donnell: Getting a refund face to face with the person who supplied the goods or services, possibly within the hearing of other consumers, is much easier. However, as the way we shop changes and shopping increasingly moves online, there will be more opportunities for traders to abuse their rights. We have an opportunity to future-proof the Bill and ensure that online purchases of goods or services are refunded quickly.

Stella Creasy: I completely agree with my hon. Friend. As more and more transactions become paperless, returning actual currency becomes easier and easier, which makes it less and less sustainable to argue that a 30-day deadline is somehow hard to meet.
The Minister queried why amendment 13 stated that the payment should be returned in the manner in which it was made, and then went on to say that the Bill provided protection from being fobbed off with vouchers. The amendment contains the specification precisely because of that fobbing off process. In instances where the consumer wishes to waive that right, the amendment would allow them to make a judgment themselves on how the refund should be paid. The amendment attempts to take into account those odd instances—although as yet nobody has been able to identify any—that would justify a lengthy delay of beyond a month, while giving the clarity of protection of a 30-day limit.
The Minister should revisit the issue and consider how we can give people confidence. I do not think that she herself feels her case is a strong one. She admits that there is a difficult balance to be struck. The proposal has strong support among consumer groups, and among the business groups that gave evidence there was an acceptance that 30 days was not an unreasonable deadline to set. We cannot see why we would not close the final loophole in the process, so that consumers, having gone through the various hurdles we will go on to discuss, can know that there is an end in sight to any complaints process.
We reserve the right to come back to the matter on Report. I encourage Government Members to go out and talk to their constituents; Opposition Members are certainly getting reports of people who are waiting inordinately long periods of time to get their money back, which has financial consequences for them. In a Consumer Rights Bill, our eye should be on the impact on the consumer of such delays, rather than the impact on the trader. With that in mind, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Stella Creasy: I beg to move amendment 19, in clause20,page11,line24,at end insert—
‘(9A) A consumer shall not be obliged to incur any costs when returning rejected goods except those incurred in returning the goods to the place where they acquired physical possession of the same goods.’.
The amendment deals with a matter that follows on from the previous discussion. Again, I hope that it is not controversial. It is a point that all of us have experienced, namely the cost incurred when returning a good. A consumer should not have to pay to return something that is faulty, and the amendment would require a trader to ensure that consumers do not have to incur costs in returning rejected goods except any incurred when returning the goods to the place where the consumer acquired physical possession of them.
We are not saying that the trader has to pay a consumer’s bus fare to go back to the jumper shop. However, to return to the sofa—sofas and jumpers are our concerns today, whereas it was kettles previously—a consumer should not have to pay for a sofa to be returned to the depot because it is faulty. That is a fair principle. If someone has been sold faulty goods, the problems that causes should not be compounded by their having to pay for the goods to be returned to get a refund. That the Bill does not have that clarity is a concern.

Sheila Gilmore: Has my hon. Friend come across the practice of some online companies of charging a consumer when they place an order for what is effectively return postage? If someone is returning an item because they do not like it, that might be one thing, but it is different when there is a fault. Does she have any views on that practice?

Stella Creasy: I can tell that my hon. Friend is a diligent shopper and that, despite her earlier protestations, she has her eye on the ball when it comes to such matters. She is absolutely right that a number of practices are beginning to emerge that are unfair to consumers. The Bill contains measures on unfair practices, but not the simple clarity of a provision saying that a consumer should not have to pay to return something that is faulty. That is very different from a consumer returning something because they do not like it, which they have the right to do under various store practices. The issue here is specifically whether the goods are satisfactory or fit for purpose. People should not be asked to pay for goods to be returned as well.
The amendment also that consumers should not have to pay to send a good back when they have taken delivery of it, but also that a trader should not be expected to cover the costs of a consumer getting it back to the shop. That is an important distinction, because we are looking for a good relationship between the consumer and the trader.
I am sure that the Minister will tell us that the best traders will arrange delivery and collection of items and seek to repair them. We agree, but there are some who engage in shoddy practices to fight a war of attrition with a consumer. Essentially, they say, “If you want to complain, we are going to make it so difficult for you to get your money back or get a repair that even where consumers are aware of their rights, it will be incredibly difficult for them to exercise them.” There will be these little loopholes that make it even harder for people to take something back, to get redress or to get the remedies that we are seeking to put in place through the Bill. That is why we have tabled the amendment. I hope that the Minister will at least hear our concern about that and be constructive about how we might close that loophole so that people have a simple process by which they can get things back and get their goods sorted out. They should not have to live with jumpers with holes in them or sofas that they cannot sit on because the legs are wonky.

Jennifer Willott: Under the Bill, when a consumer exercises their right to reject faulty goods, they are not obliged to return the goods to the trader unless they have agreed to do so. All the consumer needs to do is make the goods available to the trader. The consumer and the trader can, of course, arrange between themselves for the consumer to return the goods, but it is the consumer’s choice to do that. The Bill deliberately does not make it a requirement for the consumer to return faulty goods. It provides flexibility for the trader and the consumer to agree an arrangement suitable for both parties without putting the onus for return on to the consumer, which was the hon. Lady’s concern.
That situation is a continuation of the current position under the Sales of Goods Act 1979. Consumer organisations already interpret that as meaning that the consumer cannot be required to pay the cost of returning faulty goods. The Government believe, as the hon. Lady accurately predicted, that it is in the interest of the vast majority of businesses to cover those costs. A lot of businesses offer that service without our needing to specify it in legislation, because it is just good business practice and gets people to come back. It is in the trader’s interest to bear the cost in order to generate repeat business.
The hon. Lady’s amendment draws a sensible distinction between the cost of returning goods by post and the cost of simply returning goods to where they have been purchased, such as a shop. However, seeking to prescribe rules could lead to consumer detriment—for example, if the consumer had bought goods and collected them from the trader’s premises. For example, let us imagine a consumer who had travelled 100 miles in a van hired specifically to pick up a sofa from the trader’s premises. If a fault was then discovered after the consumer had taken it back home, under the amendment the trader could argue that the consumer would have to return the sofa in order to get a refund, because she had collected it from his premises, and the consumer would have to bear the cost of that. Clearly, people would not think that that was fair, but it could technically happen under the amendment.
Under the Bill as drafted, the requirement is on the trader to decide whether to collect the faulty goods, but it also allows for a consumer who is willing to return to a shop—for example, if they were going into town anyway —to be able to take something back. The requirement is on the trader, rather than on the consumer. I believe that the Bill provides the appropriate amount of flexibility on the cost of returning faulty goods, and that the amendment could potentially limit that flexibility. I also do not think that it is necessary, because it is quite clear where the requirement lies, so I hope that the hon. Lady will withdraw her amendment.

Stella Creasy: The Minister has been very helpful. Will she set out her proposals for what will happen when traders, in deciding whether to collect a good, make unreasonable demands, particularly about when they will collect goods? We have all experienced a trader who says, “I will come and collect in order for you to get your refund, but you have to be in between 1 pm and 8 pm on this particular day, and if you are not, that does not suit our delivery schedules”. Does she see any provision within the Bill to protect consumers from traders inadvertently denying their right to a refund because they have set unreasonable conditions on the process of refunding and collection?

Jennifer Willott: My understanding is that the consumer has to make the good available for the trader, rather than the trader requiring the consumer to be available at a particular time, so the onus is on the trader to come and collect it if he wants to, but the consumer has to make it available.

Stella Creasy: I am not quite sure if that is the same as making sure that the trader does not string people along I the process, but I accept the Minister’s intent in the Bill. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Question proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill.

Stella Creasy: I have one question to ask the Minister. The clause talks about the consumer exercising the right to reject, stating:
“The right is exercised if the consumer indicates to the trader that the consumer is rejecting the goods and treating the contract as at an end.”
Given the discussion we had earlier about point-of-complaint information, will she set out what she considers the indication that a contract is at an end would look like, so that we have clarity on the record about what the process would be? Does the consumer say, for example, “I’d like to exercise my right to repair”? Do they have to specify, “I am exercising my right to repair, because I am not exercising my right to reject”? Does there need to be a particular language and clarity from the consumer about their expectations in order to have indicated clearly to the trader that they wish to exercise their right to reject? Can they simply say, “I want my money back”? Is that enough, or do they have to say, “I am rejecting this good”? It would help people if the Minister set out the language.

Jennifer Willott: I have to confess, I am slightly confused about the issue that the hon. Lady raises. Under current consumer rights law, people have the right to reject items if they are faulty. There is no formal wording. They do not have to go into a shop and say to the woman behind the till, “The contract is at an end.” It is accepted as long as the intention of the consumer is clear. If what they are trying to achieve is clear, that is fine. There is no specific wording that they have to use. If they hand back a jumper and say, “I want my money back”, the intention is clear. They do not want the jumper with the hole in it, but they do want their money back, so they are exercising their right to reject and asking for a refund. I hope that that clarifies the matter.

Stella Creasy: That is very helpful. It goes back to the debate we had earlier about when in the process people are able to exercise their rights and whether they use the right definitions. In the case of some goods, they might be entitled only to a partial refund or a price reduction, and we need clarity about the process that triggers that. Clarity on how remedy complaints are addressed is a challenge. I want to ensure that no trader can say to somebody, “I’m sorry, you weren’t clear about this.” It is helpful if we can set out what the clause means.

Andrew McDonald: It occurs to me that it might be simpler, at the point when the breach arises, for the consumer to say to the trader, “I am not happy”, and the trader could say, “Your statutory rights are x, y and z”, including rejection. Someone could then say, “I’ll have that one” or “I reject it.” That would resolve the problem altogether.

Stella Creasy: I thank my hon. Friend. He has put his finger on the point I am trying to make, which is that when a term is implied and a consumer has to indicate to the trader that they are rejecting the goods, we want to ensure that the indications that might be acceptable are on the record—not in an exhaustive fashion, but so that there is some sense that we have considered how asking for a repair and asking for a partial refund might differ.

Steven Baker: Does the hon. Lady agree that a feature of the common law system means that should such a matter come before the courts, people would simply examine the facts and see what was reasonable? As stated, the measure is perfectly fine. It would be adjudicated in a proper manner.

Stella Creasy: I absolutely agree, but we are trying to make the rights as clear and simple as possible so that the matter should not have to end up in the courts. There should be consistency for everyone. The Minister has continually sought to make the point that the purpose of the legislation and the implementation group is to inform traders, making sure that traders know what someone indicating they want to reject something could look like. Knowing the expectations of consumers is helpful. That is all we were seeking from the Minister, for the record. I have no further questions about the clause.

Question put and agreed to.

Clause 20 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 21  - Partial rejection of goods

Question proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill.

Stella Creasy: “Partial rejection of goods” covers several different formulae. Again, it would be helpful for the record if the Minister set out some scenarios in which the clause might apply. It would be useful for the Committee, before some of the debates about rights to reject and rights to price reductions, to understand how the Government envisage the clause working.

Jennifer Willott: The clause is important because it clarifies consumers’ rights when they have a right to reject, but wish to reject only some of the goods. It is important for both parties that a consumer can choose to reject some or all of the goods that they buy if some breach the requirements in the Bill, rather than the whole contract automatically being treated as if it were at an end. If consumers wish to keep some goods and reject others, they can choose to reject some or all of the goods if they are affected by the breach in the Bill’s requirements, but they may not reject any of the goods that are not affected by the breach unless they reject all the goods.
 Fiona O'Donnell  rose—

Jennifer Willott: Shall I explain, and then give the hon. Lady a chance to intervene?
For example, if somebody bought a three-piece suite, and there was a fault in one of the armchairs in the matching set, the consumer would need to reject the set as a whole rather than just the faulty chair because it came as a unit. Just returning the chair to the trader would impair its value because it is part of a three-piece suite. The provision is to do with whether goods form part of a commercial unit. If a three-piece suite is sold as a unit, a consumer cannot return part of it and not the rest. One could return the whole thing or get the chair fixed, but it has to be treated as a unit.

Fiona O'Donnell: Will the Minister perhaps return to the couch, if she feels like doing that on a Tuesday? I had an experience with scatter cushions, which were part of a set. Is there any flexibility? Faced with the supplier’s demand that the whole lot went back and the alternative of keeping the faulty scatter cushion, I of course opted for the latter. Does the Minister have any views on scatter cushions?

Jennifer Willott: I am a fan of scatter cushions. Clearly, I cannot comment on the hon. Lady’s scatter cushions, but it depends on whether they were considered to be a commercial unit.

Steven Baker: I am sorry to interrupt the Minister, but some of the men in the corner here do not know what scatter cushions are. For the sake of the debate and of clarity, will she explain?

Jennifer Willott: They are those lovely cushions, which come in an array of colours and patterns, that can be scattered across a sofa—if my hon. Friend had bought one and it was not faulty. He probably has them at home and does not realise it.
The point is whether something is a commercial unit. I do not know whether the scatter cushions were a set that had to be kept together or whether they were different, and the intrinsic value of each individual item was not affected by separation from the others. If the latter is the case, the consumer has the right to reject the cushions affected by the breach, but not the others. However, a consumer cannot choose to reject some of those that are affected by the breach—some of the faulty ones—and some of the ones that are not faulty. Consumers can reject either the faulty ones or all of them. They cannot choose to keep some of cushions that are fine just because, for example, they like that particular colour.
A three-piece suite is clearly a set that goes together. On the point that the hon. Member for East Lothian made, I understand that it would depend on the type of cushions that she bought.
I hope I have answered the questions that were raised.

Stella Creasy: I rise only to point out that some of the women in the room were not sure what a scatter cushion was, either. They are non-gender specific, as far as I am told.
That was helpful of the Minister, because there are some confusing formulations regarding where the partial right to reject may apply. The example from my hon. Friend the Member for East Lothian shows exactly why we need to be clear about that as we progress to the right to reject and the right to a price reduction. I thank the Minister for her answer.

Jennifer Willott: Just to clarify a previous point that I made, returning to the discussion about what someone can reject, if it is not a commercial unit, the consumer might want to reject the faulty ones and keep the non-faulty ones.

Question put and agreed to.

Clause 21 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 22  - Time limit for short-term right to reject

Stella Creasy: I beg to move amendment 20, in clause22,page13,line23,at end insert—
‘(4A) The consumer may defer the commencement of the short term right to reject goods if they stated at the time of purchase that they wish to defer the use of the goods to a specific date and can reasonably be expected to delay the use of the goods.’.
The amendment will be of increasing interest to Opposition Members because it is about specifying a time limit—something the Minister is reluctant to do in other parts of the Bill but is keen to do here. The amendment looks at how we can make the time limit flexible where it needs to be so. I therefore hope that Government Members who have been arguing for flexibility will support the amendment and the intention behind it.
We welcome the setting of a default time limit of 30 days; that is easy for consumers to remember. We recognise that the concept of a “reasonable” period of time has always been a bit like beauty—in the eye of the beholder. We know that some shops and shop assistants will say, “Time’s up”, while others recognise that it is perfectly reasonable to want to bring something back within a much longer period.
Our amendment looks at the matter from the other perspective, trying to protect consumers who may be seeking to buy goods for a delayed use. It asks whether there are circumstances in which it would be acceptable—indeed, desirable—to defer the 30-day period for the short-term right to reject.
In order to do that, it is worth looking at what the short-term right to reject is about. It is about looking at something and knowing straight away that it is not right, does not meet the test, is not fit for purpose, or is not satisfactory. Taking the example of the dress that my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh East has bought, which she promises she will wear on Thursday—if we are lucky and if it is sunny—if she looks at it when she gets it out of the wardrobe and it has a big hole in it, it is clearly not right straight away. Luckily, my hon. Friend knows that she is within her 30 days, and under the Bill, she will be able to return it.
However, are there instances in which people might buy something but expect a longer period? A suggestion that we looked at was a wedding dress, which someone may buy well in advance, but only when they come closer to the day and try it on do they realise that it is not right. I am sorry that the hon. Member for Wycombe has left the room, because I wonder whether we would need to explain to him what a wedding dress is and some of the problems that might arise with them. I am sure he would know all too well about them and would concur.

Laura Sandys: Does the hon. Lady consider that a wedding dress should be used more than once?

Stella Creasy: Given the legislation we recently passed, I wonder whether that is an offer.

Fiona O'Donnell: Will my hon. Friend give way?

Stella Creasy: I wonder whether my hon. Friend is going to offer me the opportunity to use a wedding dress twice.

Fiona O'Donnell: Does my hon. Friend think that it is reasonable to expect a consumer to wear their dress again within 30 days?

Stella Creasy: Having been to some registry offices and some weddings, it is not beyond reasonable possibility.
The ability to reject goods outright and return them within 30 days, rather than seeking repair, might be allowable with some goods. Providing the flexibility to allow a trader and a consumer to agree on a longer period for the consumer to return something directly is reasonable—something that someone may, for delayed gratification, need to order substantially in advance, for example, to check that it is not faulty. It seems right to provide that flexibility, and amendment 20 is designed to do that. It would offer the consumer the opportunity to defer their right to account for the fact that they may want to delay the use of the product.
The amendment refers to a reasonable expectation of delay. We are not talking about a uniform expectation. Wedding dresses seem a good example: a consumer would have a reasonable expectation of being able to order something substantially in advance and try it on, but then have the product for a period considerably longer than a month. It might not be used for a month—perhaps someone might have second thoughts and get cold feet.

Laura Sandys: I just wanted to ask: can one take a husband or wife back after 30 days, or is there a 14-day cooling off period?

Stella Creasy: The interesting question is whether they would be a good or a service. All of us have heard some views on either side of that argument—it would be finely balanced.
At any rate, there are some examples. If the Minister is pleading that we need flexibility regarding a 30-day right to a refund—30 days for a consumer to get their money back—there must surely be some cases in which we would want flexibility about assessing a good.

Mary Glindon: Does my hon. Friend agree that there is a precedent for the proposal? At Christmas time, some shops and companies allow customers a longer return period and give them a special receipt with which the goods can be returned. The proposal is not beyond businesses nowadays.

Stella Creasy: My hon. Friend is absolutely right. All of us have known the misery of trying to go Christmas shopping on 23 or 24 December, and know that being able to shop in advance—to delay that gratification of using the good—makes the experience less stressful. It makes sense for traders to be able to offer consumers a longer time period for that short-term right to reject. It is a different matter from some of the rights later in the Bill—situations that might require a repair, for example.
To give an example, someone might buy a toy for Christmas. Indeed, last Christmas we found that my nephew had been bought not one but two Gruffalo suits and—I can say this because he is not quite of the age when he is reading Hansard, although I am sure he will—even a five-year-old does not need two Gruffalo suits. We were able to return one and reject it outright. He had been bought two Gruffalo suits because that is what can happen at Christmas; having a slightly longer period to return one fitted well with that.

Stephen Doughty: My hon. Friend is making an excellent point, but I was thinking more mundanely about long-term purchases of non-perishable goods, particularly dry goods such as bags of rice, tinned goods and so on. A restaurant, small business or indeed individual consumer might chose to stock up on such items. The items could have reasonable expiry dates, and so it might be discovered only at a much later stage that they were off or there was a fault. A consumer would then want to return them but would not be able to do so.

Stella Creasy: My hon. Friend is absolutely right. We all accept that 30 days should be the standard or backstop, perhaps for Gruffalo suits, perishable goods, husbands, wedding dresses—the lot. But where consumers enter into particular contracts with a trader in which they would like to defer that right and the trader is happy to honour that, it would be remiss of us not to offer that flexibility. Indeed, I am sure that the hon. Member for Braintree would feel that was the cold, dead hand of state regulation curtailing the market for wedding dresses, Gruffalo suits, and, indeed, Christmas presents. He would not want to be the Grinch who stole Christmas.
If we say that 30 days is the time limit for spotting a problem, we have to ask ourselves what the consequences will be in all contexts—is it enough time to spot a fault in an item or to be sure that something operates in the way that it should? We should be sure that it is enough time for someone to make a reasonable complaint and to exercise the short-term right to reject. That right is clearly about whether a good is good enough. It is not a question of it needing to be repaired, or of there being a fault that is not clear; the issue is that the good simply is not good enough.
The amendment would give that little edge of flexibility to the legislation to allow for those circumstances in which both the trader and the consumer are happy to extend the 30-day period. I am sure that some Members are wearing TM Lewin products; that company offers a 90-day return period. Why would we restrict its ability to do so in some circumstances? Such offers give consumers a bit more confidence when making big purchases. After all, we hope to buy a wedding dress only once in our lifetime, but if someone needs to buy one more than once, they want to be sure that the next time, they have a bit more time to get things right—whether that be the husband or wife in question, or the dress itself.
I hope the Minister will take the amendment in the spirit in which it is intended: to tease out some issues and ensure that the Bill does not inadvertently restrict good practices.

Fiona O'Donnell: My knees are enjoying a good workout from rising to speak this afternoon, and I am very grateful for the opportunity to do so. Far from this Committee being a therapy session, I think I may need therapy afterwards, because I am aware of many opportunities I have missed—as in the case of my scatter cushions—to exercise my consumer rights, and some which I need to exercise quickly when I get home on Thursday, because I now realise I am not protected in the way I thought I was. Perhaps I can help the Minister in responding to this amendment by giving a few examples of what I am talking about.
I will take the Minister back to my sofa again, with the scatter cushions. I have to confess to the Committee that I did not move the sofa within 30 days of buying it in order to vacuum underneath, but when I did, I discovered faulty castors. I would therefore like to hear the Minister’s views on flexibility, as we often do not discover a particular fault with the goods we have bought until we come to use that part of the product or service.
I have another confession for the Committee. I am a knitter. I enjoy knitting; I find it therapeutic. I have arthritis in my fingers as a result of my devotion to knitting. I am not suggesting for a minute that we should refer back to the previous clause and goods being sold as a commercial unit. However, there will be those on the Committee—men and women—with a vast knowledge of knitting. Let us say that the consumer buys a number of balls of yarn—they may be presented in some other form—with the view to completing a whole product made up of those individual items. It is extremely frustrating when one gets to a certain stage in the knitting process and discovers a fault in one of the units of yarn and is then unable to finish the whole product. I do not have as much time for knitting these days as I used to. With that in mind, does the Minister think that knitters such as me would benefit from the protection that some flexibility around the 30-day provision would offer? As long as I am serving on this Committee—unless, as in the days of the guillotine in France, I am allowed to bring my knitting in and complete the Arran jumper that is currently under way—it is unlikely that I will have the time to find any faults within 30 days.

Sheila Gilmore: It has sometimes occurred to me, as someone who often spends long hours waiting to speak in the Chamber, that that might not be a bad means of occupying the hands while allowing the brain to engage totally in what is going on.

Fiona O'Donnell: Mr Amess, if at any point you wish to offer us some advice—I am getting very excited at the thought of bringing my knitting in, although I realise that if I did I would have to travel here by train; I do not think that knitting needles would be permitted on an aircraft.
There is a real point here about seasonal goods, which often go on sale at reduced prices at the end of the season. Consumers flock to buy them but then do not try them out. Here, I am thinking of the Christmas tree lights that I bought in the January sale, and which I have not tested. When I get home, I will test them before picking up my knitting. Does the Minister think that this is an area where some flexibility in the 30-day rule might apply?
We are increasingly seeing television adverts that encourage the consumer to buy into absolutely awful products. The latest one I have seen concerns building the “Pirates of the Caribbean” galleon. Over a number of weeks, the consumer purchases the magazine and assembles the parts. If at some point the parts prove to be faulty, the whole galleon will be put at risk. What is the Minister’s view of that issue?

Rehman Chishti: Will the hon. Lady give way?

Fiona O'Donnell: I will indeed—finally, something the hon. Gentleman has some knowledge of.

Rehman Chishti: I was listening very carefully and intently to the hon. Lady. If someone buys a product but does not then use it, they will not find out whether it is faulty. A lot of people would say that the consumer has responsibilities as well as rights, so when someone buys a product, they should test it as soon as possible to check that it works, rather than leaving it until much later down the line.

Fiona O'Donnell: If only the same consumer rights applied to MPs, and perhaps Governments, Mr Amess. The hon. Gentleman says that it is reasonable to expect that such products be tested, but perhaps some flexibility is required. Let us say that a member of this Committee recently bought some skis. Unfortunately, due to the weather, there would not have been an opportunity to try them out.

Rehman Chishti: There is a fantastic artificial ski slope near my Kent constituency, so the hon. Lady does not have to go abroad to try her skis out; she can come to my constituency. There is always an opportunity.

Fiona O'Donnell: The hon. Gentleman is perhaps skating on thin ice

Mark Durkan: He is on a slippery slope.

Fiona O'Donnell: Yes, he is on a slippery slope with that one.
As I say, some flexibility is required. As consumers, we cannot think that all the rights are on our side in this relationship and that we have no responsibilities. I do not know whether the hon. Member for Gillingham and Rainham has had a chance to use the dry ski slope to which he refers—there is one very near my constituency, in fact—but surely, a little compassion, common sense and flexibility should be demonstrated on this issue.

Andrew McDonald: Would the same principle not apply to the purchase of a box set, for example? It would be greedy to watch the whole box set of a series such as “The Sopranos” in one night, although some Members have claimed to have watched several box sets consecutively through the night. Nevertheless, it is possible for people to be a bit more sparing in their viewing of such dramas. They could watch the first six discs, get to discs seven, eight and nine and discover that three people are dead whom they did not even know were part of the plot, and be totally confused by the time they get to disc 10. It would therefore be entirely unreasonable to suggest that they have to retain the entire box set. Surely to goodness, even if it is 30 days down the track, they should be able to return it saying, “It doesn’t meet the standards. I want my money back. Otherwise, I’m sending the Sopranos round.”

Fiona O'Donnell: My hon. Friend makes an excellent point, in that, for some products, it would not be sensible to expect their consumption—[ Interruption ] —or consummation, in the case of marriages, as someone suggests from a sedentary position, within 30 days. Therefore, some flexibility is required.
In this global era, increasingly, many of us have family and friends who do not live in the UK. Sending them Christmas gifts by the cheapest and greenest method can take several weeks. Allowance must also be made for the time it takes, for example, to return to me the wonderful jumper that I knitted, if a fault is discovered with one of the arms.
It is worth the Minister’s probing this issue, and I look forward to her response.

Sheila Gilmore: Although it might seem that some of these issues are relatively small scale, or that it is somehow unreasonable of consumers not to immediately unwrap such goods, there are a number of circumstances where people do not want to undo the wrapping, try on an item, or make sure that the gift being given for a specific event is appropriate. When we give wedding gifts to our friends and family, we are unlikely to want to open them, although I have to confess that occasionally, I have opened up books, because books are wonderful, as I have said. I have been very tempted, having gone Christmas shopping and bought new DVDs, to watch them before giving them away. But of course, I would not do that. Moreover, given the nature of the packaging, the gift recipient would guess what had happened.
In the case of gifts, some of which might be quite valuable, a person will not make any attempt to interfere with the official packaging, or indeed with the often wonderful packaging if the shop has gift-wrapped it.

Mary Glindon: Does my hon. Friend agree that when we buy such gifts, our assumption is that we bought them as perfect, so there is no need to test them before the recipient receives them?

Sheila Gilmore: I think we always hope for that, but it is a good example of why one would not in the normal course of events start looking and checking at that point. Someone might have made a purchase at a time that is not a week or two weeks, or even a month, before the event in question, perhaps because that would not be the most convenient time. I know a lot of people who describe doing their Christmas shopping over a whole year, because they are budgeting their gift buying. One way is to save up, but a lot of people make a point of buying something that they think will be suitable every month or so. If they are like me, they will hide it away so well that they forget they have bought it, and they will go out and buy a new set of presents. I generally do not buy gifts so early, because it would be pointless, but a lot of people do, and they do it for very good reasons. I do not think they would want to check the goods in between times.

Fiona O'Donnell: Does my hon. Friend agree that we are making a reasonable request? We are not asking for excessive duress on the supplier of the goods, as in the case of a friend who worked at Marks and Spencer. A gift of Turkish delight was returned to the store, and when the store checked, it found that it had not been sold in that form for over four years.

Sheila Gilmore: I see, so it was the giver who held on to the gift, rather like those raffle prizes that we are all familiar with at various fund-raising events. They seem to circulate repeatedly in a sophisticated form of pass the parcel.
The wording of the amendment does not suggest that it would be open season for people to return things at any time for any reason. Whether someone would be able to do that would depend on the nature of the purchase. Given the examples that Members have given, it would not be unreasonable for the amendment to be accepted. It would not make a great deal of difference to the tenor of the Bill, and it would allow people to exercise their consumer rights if they found themselves needing to. The situation would be the same as if they had opened the product and started to use it as soon as they purchased it. Whatever the reason, delayed gratification should not mean that people cannot exercise their consumer rights.

Jennifer Willott: As a number of hon. Members have said, the debate is about flexibility in the 30-day period. I have been asked to give examples, so I shall start with the example of skis. Let us say that a consumer buys a pair of skis in the summer. Under the amendment, the consumer would be able to tell the shopkeeper that they did not want to use the skis until the winter. In most circumstances, aside from the fabulous ski centre in the constituency of the hon. Member for Gillingham and Rainham, it would not be reasonable to expect someone to try out the skis in the summer and be able to know whether there is an issue with them. Under the amendment, the consumer would be able to defer the start of their short-term right to reject until the first day that they used their skis. They would have 30 days from that date to reject the goods if they breached the statutory rights.
I am sorry to disappoint hon. Members, but the Government believe that the amendment would undermine the benefits of having the certainty of a 30-day period. We consulted on that at length and concluded that having a longer period for some goods would be difficult, complex and costly for traders to operate. A significant benefit of the Bill is the simplicity of making it as easy as possible for consumers to know their rights and businesses their obligations. The amendment would undermine that simplicity.
It is true that there has been some support for an exception to the 30-day rule. However, when we consulted, real concerns were expressed. We heard evidence on that at the Committee’s first sitting. The British Retail Consortium also raised concerns when the Select Committee on Business, Innovation and Skills undertook pre-legislative scrutiny, stating:
“We welcome the drive of the legislation to provide clarity for retailers. It is really important that, as retailers, our staff understand what customers’ rights are.”
I think we would all completely agree with that. It continued:
“To see the 30 days set quite in stone is helpful to us, because if you start to introduce exemptions from that and a reasonableness test there is a question around how much is included in that and what circumstances would arise.”
That makes it clear where the difficulties start. For example, to going back to the example of skis, it is clear that there would be practical problems. Would the trader have to keep a record of who bought what and when they said they were going to start using the product, so that they knew when the 30 days would start? It would not be a reasonable expectation on businesses to keep such records, and it would be extremely burdensome on them. It would also increase the scope for disputes. We are trying to achieve the exact opposite by having the clarity of a 30-day period.
A fixed time provides clarity and gives consumers and businesses certainty to ensure that they know what is going on. Hon. Members have talked about having longer periods, and the hon. Member for North Tyneside made it clear that a number of businesses offer them. The hon. Member for Walthamstow talked of businesses offering 90 days. The Bill would not prevent traders from offering longer than 30 days; the 30-day period is a minimum. It is fine for businesses to offer longer than that, particularly at certain times of the year. Some businesses that we have spoken to have said they would do that pretty much automatically at Christmas time, for example. They do it to get a competitive edge over the other shops in their high street, because offering a longer period of time encourages people to buy from them rather than from somebody else. We would not want to impact on that flexibility. The 30-day period is a minimum and does not prevent businesses from being more flexible and advertising longer periods.

Rehman Chishti: I am grateful to the Minister for acknowledging that Kent has a fantastic ski resort. If a business is more flexible by saying it is happy to have a longer period where people can buy an item and bring it back, it is more likely that people will go to its outlets rather than others that are limited and rigid in what they can do and provide.

Jennifer Willott: That may well be the case, and it is for the individual business to decide. As long as they all provide the minimum 30-day statutory period, it is entirely for businesses to decide whether offering a longer period will encourage more people to go to them. It is definitely a competitive advantage, and a number of businesses do it already. The Bill will do nothing to prevent that.
Nor will the Bill prevent businesses from offering periods of time to return goods that are not faulty. We have heard a number of examples today, such as the two Gruffalo suits. My three-year-old would probably like one, but not two. The Gruffalo suits and the unworn wedding dress with no faults would not be covered by the 30-day right to reject, which applies if goods are faulty. However, that does not prevent businesses from offering terms during which when people can bring items back simply because they have had a change of mind. A number of businesses do that, and it would not be affected by the 30-day period in the Bill. They are perfectly at liberty to offer far more generous terms than the minimum laid out in the Bill.
I would also clarify that even after that 30-day period has ended, customers will still have plenty of remedies available to them if a fault is discovered. In the case of the dodgy castors on the sofa of the hon. Member for East Lothian, which she discovered after the 30-day period, or the dry goods mentioned by the hon. Member for Cardiff South and Penarth, or the box sets mentioned by the hon. Member for Middlesbrough, if there is a fault after that 30-day short-term right to reject period, a consumer will still have the right to ask for the product to be replaced or repaired.
In the case of the castors, there would still be the right to repair them once, and if the dry goods were faulty after the 30 days—if they had gone off or whatever—there would clearly be the right to ask for a replacement. In many cases, that would probably be preferable if one was in the middle of cooking something. One would probably want to get a replacement as quickly as possible. Consumers will still have rights after the 30 days, it is just that they will move into the second tier—the right to a replacement or repair.
I hope that the clarity of having that 30-day minimum period and saying that businesses can go further if they wish, and being clear that there is still a raft of remedies available to consumers if a fault is identified after that, will lay hon. Members’ minds to rest. I ask the hon. Member for Walthamstow to withdraw the amendment.

Stella Creasy: I thank the Minister for that answer, although, I have to admit, not as much as I thank the hon. Member for South Thanet for what, as far as I am concerned, was an offer of marriage. If someone tells me to buy a wedding dress, I am going to take it as an implied contract under this legislation.

Laura Sandys: Does the hon. Lady feel that we could have a 14-day cooling-off period?

Stella Creasy: Therein lies the story of my life, I suspect, and we are debating a 30-day rejection period in this clause.
What the Minister has set out is helpful. There are clearly some types of goods for which it is right to consider extending the provisions in the clause. To have it set out for the record that consumers can request that is very helpful. We would like to see it clearly and specifically stated and communicated, perhaps by the magic implementation group, that the period does not have to be 30 days. That is not least because none of us would like to be in the shops, perhaps in the last three weeks of December, watching everybody trying to take their goods back.

Jennifer Willott: I would just like to clarify this point. The business has to provide a minimum 30 days, then it can decide to extend it. Under the Bill, the consumer will not have the right to request that the 30 days be extended. The business will have the right to offer an extended period as a way of attracting customers.

Stella Creasy: That is helpful. The point we are trying to make is that in trying to simplify the requirement, we should not inadvertently give businesses the view that they cannot offer an extended period. We should make sure that that is clear in the implementation work and the guidance on the Bill. There are a number of circumstances in which it is right to offer an extended period to return thing, Christmas, weddings and when people get round to hoovering being just a few of those situations. With that in mind, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Clause 22 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 23  - Right to repair or replacement

Stella Creasy: I beg to move amendment 21, in clause23,page14,line3,leave out ‘a reasonable time’ and insert
‘30 days, unless an alternative timescale is agreed with the consumer prior to the commencement of any repair activity,’.

David Amess: With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:
Amendment 22, in clause23,page14,line22,at end insert ‘, and
(c) the financial impact on the consumer of the completion of any repair that takes longer than 30 days.’.
Amendment 34, in clause43,page27,line3,leave out ‘a reasonable time’ and insert
‘30 days unless an alternative timescale is agreed with the consumer prior to the commencement of any repair activity’.
Amendment 35, in clause43,page27,line16,after ‘conformity’, insert
‘and the financial impact on the consumer of the completion of any repair that takes longer than 30 days’.

Stella Creasy: Having been rejected in the previous clause, I hope we can now repair my broken heart.

Fiona O'Donnell: Aaah!

Stella Creasy: My hon. Friend mocks me. She does not know what a sensitive soul I am and what a wonderful design for a wedding dress I had in mind.
The amendments are about the right to repair or replacement. In the previous clause we looked at how someone might reject something in the short term. We now move into that time after that 30-day period, to the point where someone discovers something is wrong and has the right to a single repair or replacement of faulty goods, and if it is not done properly, to a refund. Within all of that, we seek to standardise some of the time periods in the Bill. We might be about to turn the sitting into a therapy session on the consequences of repairs. Indeed, the Minister talked earlier about the uncertainty for consumers about multiple repairs. We are all concerned about the war of attrition between traders and consumers when something goes wrong, and about traders seeking to diminish the consumer’s capacity to exercise their right to a remedy by being unhelpful or not offering repairs.
We welcome the clarification in the clause on the right to a repair. We are concerned, however, that the clause currently allows the trader a “reasonable” time to repair or replace goods. As we have already discussed, reasonable is one of those inherently subjective terms and we are concerned that that war of attrition could continue even under this legislation, albeit as a curtailed war as the consumer would have only one right to request a repair before requesting a refund.
Nevertheless, if we return to that sofa that has finally been moved, at the jurisdiction of the hoover, and discover that the legs are faulty—[Interruption.]It has to be moved only once to discover that the legs are faulty and, therefore, that my hon. Friend the Member for East Lothian needs to get it repaired. She has had it for more than 30 days. When she sat on it, it wobbled, but she did not realise that the legs were wonky until she moved it and discovered that the castors were not in place. They were broken and not of a quality that could be described as satisfactory. She calls the shop where she bought it and says, “I would like to exercise my right to a repair.” It gives her a repair time that it considers reasonable, but to her that means sitting without a sofa for a length of time.
We might say that my hon. Friend could stand up—after all, we have heard that she might have a problem with her knees, so we want to ensure that she is in good health and active. However, what if that faulty item were a washing machine? To ask a family with a heavy washing load to wait a considerable time for a repair to be undertaken does not seem to be fair, even if the trader considers it a reasonable time.
Yet again, we are trying to standardise some of the terms in the Bill. We think it is fair, as indeed does Citizens Advice, that there should be a standard 30-day time period unless the consumer agrees to an extension. My hon. Friend may want the particular Italian craftsman who did not get the castors right on her sofa the first time to be involved in the repair. In that case, she might be prepared to wait more than 30 days. However, she wants her washing machine to be fixed as quickly as possible, and we do not think it is reasonable for a trader to suggest that it will take longer than 30 days to get an engineer out to fix that. We think that guidance on what is an acceptable repair period seems reasonable.

Brooks Newmark: I hear the hon. Lady very clearly. I do not know what a washing machine is, but I certainly know what a lift is, and we cannot even get the lifts in Portcullis House on the parliamentary estate repaired in 30 days, because the parts may not be available. How will she seek assurances and guarantees that parts will be readily available for replacement? I suggest that that is a triumph of hope over experience.

Stella Creasy: I am sure that if the hon. Gentleman were to speak to his dry cleaner, he would happily explain what a washing machine is. The amendments are about changing the behaviour of traders. We all accept that a good trader would try to undertake a repair as quickly as possible, especially on items such as white good. Indeed, they would try to avoid selling faulty goods. For example, leaving a family without a fridge for longer than 30 days does not seem appropriate, as it could have serious health consequences. By standardising the reasonable time period at 30 days unless the consumer agrees to an extension —the amendment would provide that flexibility—we would strike the right balance between not leaving consumers in that war of attrition with a trader and ensuring that traders’ behaviour is to the benefit of the consumer.
The amendment is simple. Let me give some examples of where it could come into play, not least the lifts in the House of Commons. I am sure that the hon. Gentleman could explain that the lifts not operating is a problem, particularly during a Division.

Brooks Newmark: To make it even more practical, I lived in south London, near Elephant and Castle, and none of the lifts ever worked—people sometimes had to trudge up 12 or 15 flights of stairs. I hear clearly what the hon. Lady is saying, but I fear that her proposal is highly impractical.

Stella Creasy: I am concerned that, as I feared, this evening is turning into a therapy session about the traumas the hon. Gentleman had to endure when having to walk up 12 flights of stairs. He has borne it well.

Stephen McPartland: Fortunately, the lifts where I live in Stevenage are normally fixed within five working days, and hon. Members are more than welcome to come to Stevenage.
I have a lot of sympathy for the spirit of many of the amendments, but the problem is their practicality—how they would work in real life. I remember when our family’s washing machine—there was me, a brother and two sisters—broke down. It is not reasonable for such a family to have to wait 30 days. Waiting more than a week is not reasonable. “Reasonable” must apply to both parties. If it were replaced with “30 days”, most manufacturers or suppliers would say that the wait would be 30 days.

Stella Creasy: We have a lot of sympathy, not least with the efficiency with which the lifts are fixed in Stevenage. I am sure that the hon. Member for Braintree is dreaming of Stevenage.

Stephen McPartland: And only six flights of stairs.

Stella Creasy: And only six flights of stairs. Goodness me, that is nirvana.
The point that the hon. Member for Braintree is making is that people should not have to wait. That is true, but the challenge is to know what a trader would consider to be a reasonable period. We have heard about shoddy practices, and traders might argue that they could not obtain a part or that they needed to call out a particular engineer, and delay the process unduly. The amendment would, as Citizens Advice said, empower consumers to demand a better level of service and to have an input into what is reasonable.
The risk is that consumers would have to seek redress through the courts, but if someone has washing piling up, the last thing they would want to do is to go to court to have a repair done because a trader believes it is entirely reasonable to make them wait 30 days.

Oliver Colvile: First, as we are promoting individual places, may I pay tribute to the ski slope in my city of Plymouth?
Surely any trader will want to ensure that they deliver a good quality service and will be keen to ensure that they do not get a reputation for producing a rubbish service.

Stella Creasy: I absolutely agree with the hon. Gentleman. That is why one could argue that there are inconsistencies in the Bill. It introduces a 30-day period for the right to reject because it was recognised that the concept of reasonableness was not strong enough to enable consumers to exercise that right. On parallel rights, when consumers might also have expectations of what is reasonable, it does not specify the concept of reasonableness and so leaves people open to challenges.
Good traders will operate quickly and efficiently because they want repeat custom and do not want to be exposed on “Watchdog” or tweeted about. The bad traders will leave people hanging about, whether for a refund or a repair. The Government have opened the door to the concept that reasonableness sometimes needs an explicit time limit, so why are we not using that to define some of the other elements of the law? [Interruption.] The hon. Member for Braintree looks vexed—and he is thinking about those lifts.

Brooks Newmark: I was in business for 25 years, and much as I understand the hon. lady’s direction of travel, many small businesses that I came across simply could not afford to hold the inventory or the spare white goods she is talking about, or they may have had a bad batch delivered to them with the result that they themselves found it hard to source a replacement. I understand what the hon. Lady is saying, but in the real world I am afraid that legislating for something like this is highly impracticable, which is why I cannot support her amendment.

Stella Creasy: I am flattered that the hon. Gentleman believes that I have spent time in the nirvana that is Stevenage. I confess that I have; I relatives who live there. However, in the real world here, asking people to wait such a long time for a repair on a good on which their family depends, and giving them no capacity to challenge the behaviour of a trader except through a court of law, seems to us unfair. I caution the hon. Gentleman—
 Sheila Gilmore  rose—
 Mr Newmark  rose—

Stella Creasy: My hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh East is straining to get in, so I shall give way to her first. I am sure she will tell us about stairs and lifts in Edinburgh, if that will make the hon. Gentleman happy.

Sheila Gilmore: I certainly could, but the parallel is not the point. We are dealing with people buying new goods that they would reasonably expect to work, but which have failed to work. Even if parts are difficult to get—that may be so—somebody is surely entitled to get their money back if the goods cannot be repaired in the appropriate time. That is different from repairing a lift here in the House or in a high-rise block. Yes, I have experience of being told by manufacturers that they could only get parts from Hungary, for example, and therefore tenants in my ward would have to remain without a lift for some considerable time. We are not talking about the same thing here.

Stella Creasy: I agree with my hon. Friend. There is a risk that bad traders will use the concept of reasonableness to mean “as long as a piece of string”. Therefore, consumers will not have the protection intended by the legislation from the detriment of having to wait for a repair to be carried out.
The amendment would simply standardise rights and give people clarity about what they can expect and when. As we debated this morning, the lack of information available to people about what their rights should be is a problem in itself when it comes to their negotiating such things. The amendment would give people the opportunity to make those rights and remedies work for them.

Brooks Newmark: Again, the hon. Lady is failing to find a mechanism through which one can differentiate between suppliers with bad or malicious intent and those who simply, as I said, cannot get a particular part, or even a replacement fridge, dishwasher or washing machine, within 30 days. There is lack of understanding of what might be a supplier’s good intent, versus what might be malicious intent. That is difficult to legislate for.

Stella Creasy: The hon. Gentleman should look at the clause, because in those circumstances and with the businesses he is talking about, we return to the example of the trader who makes beautiful castors but seems to have misused a particular material in doing so. My hon. Friend the Member for East Lothian could agree to an extension of the time available to do that repair.
The legislation as drafted refers to the repair being done and therefore not being able to require a refund because the repair cannot be done within a reasonable time,
“unless giving the trader that time would cause significant inconvenience to the consumer”.
There is already provision in the legislation for the point that we are trying to make with the amendment. We are trying to protect the trader as much as the consumer, because were somebody to say, “Actually, if I have to wait two weeks for my washing machine to be repaired, that is inconvenient, so that’s it; you’ve broken my rights. I want to get a refund.” Some of us might have some sympathy in that case, because two weeks’ worth of washing stacking up is not a pleasant experience. The trader would have a right to say, “Well, hang on a minute. That is not a reasonable time for us to get the relevant part of the washing machine that has broken down.” Washing machines have many parts—many cogs and gears—that may break and something might get stuck in the drum, or something might go wrong with the digital equipment. They are a behemoth of problems for many people. When they flood, they are terrible.
We need to ensure that there is clarity on both sides about what a reasonable time is, given that the legislation as drafted contains some of these provisos already.

Oliver Colvile: I am curious. I have a lot of registered social landlords and significant council housing in my constituency. Given the number of times that lifts do not work and the fact that the tenants are paying rent, would the hon. Lady put the local authority or the RSL in a position whereby they are required to ensure that the lifts work properly?

Stella Creasy: The hon. Gentleman makes an important point. As we discussed this morning and will discuss again, the Bill covers business relationships including, in clause 2, with
“any government department or local or public authority.”
As someone who has a large amount of social housing in my constituency, I find the idea that people should just put up with lifts that repeatedly do not function unacceptable. It is unacceptable behaviour on the part of an RSL that has a contract with tenants who pay rent and therefore have a reasonable expectation of accessing their property in the manner to which they are accustomed. If they have go up not just 12 flights of stairs but even more—

Brooks Newmark: Eighteen.

Stella Creasy: Eighteen. I would be very sympathetic to the idea that having to deal repeatedly with a lift that has broken down means that the lift is not fit for purpose and the tenants’ statutory rights have been broken.

Oliver Colvile: I had a recent case whereby I went to see a constituent who lived in a block of flats in Plymouth owned by one of the RSLs. I walked in and not only was litter strewn all over the place, but someone had been using it as a loo. It was utterly appalling and the tenants were expected to put up with it. If that had happened in some of my more middle class areas, people would certainly not put up with that kind of rubbish. We must make sure that we have a better understanding of how we will deliver good quality social housing, and that local authorities and RSLs do not allow such poor conditions.

Stella Creasy: I would go much further, and I hope that I can convince the hon. Gentleman to join us on the libertarian left in saying that people should not have to wait for redress from a third party in those circumstances and that, if they are paying a tenancy, they have a right to a basic set of service standards. Indeed, those are consumer rights.

Andrew McDonald: An important point has been made about people’s expectations of the services that have been described. However, we are getting into territory where we are comparing apples and pears and lifts and stairs. It does not help us get much further. On the original point that the hon. Member for Braintree made, the clue is in the title—the Consumer Rights Bill. From time immemorial, it has been a principle of English law that when we consider such legislative provisions, it is all about the rights of the consumer. It is perfectly reasonable for someone to say, “I have purchased a good from you. You have my money; I have a crock. I am in a poor position. I really think you’ve got to help me out here.” It is not good enough to say, “I’m sorry, but we’ve got problems further up the line.” We keep returning to that point. That is not the consumer’s problem. We are considering the relationship between the trader and the consumer, and that is where it starts and ends.

Stella Creasy: My hon. Friend is right. It is important to ask who bears the cost and the consequence of a failure to deliver a good. Does that include the failure to respond within a reasonable time?
I want to draw the Committee’s attention to the second amendment in the group, which deals with
“the financial impact on the consumer of the completion of any repair that takes longer than 30 days.”
Conservative Members might be determined to protect traders’ supply chains at the expense of the consumer who has to wait, but surely they must be sympathetic to the idea that someone who has been without a particular good for a substantial amount of time, and has consequently suffered detriment to them and their family, should be entitled to compensation, which they should not necessarily have to seek through the courts. There should be an expectation that that family is reimbursed for the impact of the delay in undertaking a repair. Otherwise, we are asking people to wait for an unspecified amount of the time that the trader considers to be reasonable and have nothing to show for it at the end.
Even if Conservative Members are a little a wary of the first half of the group of amendments, I draw their attention to the second half and ask them to recognise the points about fairness. To go back to the point that the hon. Member for Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport made, I do not believe that it is fair to expect people in social housing to live without basic services and goods to which they are entitled and for which they have a direct business contract with their local authority. They should be entitled to complain and expect redress. I help residents with that, but I wish that I did not have to do that.

Brooks Newmark: There is an ability to gain redress—tenants can simply withhold their rent. Would the hon. Lady suggest doing that? If, for example, a lift in social housing does not work, the tenant can simply say, “I refuse to pay to the rent.” I am highly sympathetic to that. When I used to trudge up and down the stairs at the Elephant and Castle, when I was a lone Tory in Browning ward, that is what I would suggest—do not pay your rent—but they would say, “I cannot not pay my rent; I will be kicked out”. So there does not seem to be redress.
Going back to the point that the hon. Member for Middlesbrough made, I understand the proposal from the Labour Front Bench, but if a business is not a Halfords, a Currys or a large supplier, which can get access to spare parts or even replacements; if a company is a small, entrepreneurial business with one or two people working, holding perhaps one fridge or two washing machines at a time, it is much more difficult from a practical standpoint. Such small companies may wish to replace the part that has become faulty, but the practicality is that, further down the supply chain, they cannot get it in order to provide redress. There is good faith on their part, there is no bad faith; they just cannot actually deliver what the hon. Lady wants to change in the Bill.

Stella Creasy: I want to draw the debate to a close, but I say to the hon. Gentleman that I think he is mistaken, because of the way the clause is drafted, and what we are seeking to amend. In particular, if the trader was not able to fulfil that requirement, they could offer the consumer a refund. The trader could simply say, “Actually, I cannot offer you a repair within a reasonable time.” I think we would all agree that 30 days is a reasonable time.

Brooks Newmark: Sometimes it is not.

Stella Creasy: Well, as a standard. Or the trader could, if it is not acceptable, negotiate that with the consumer. The amendment offers both those flexibilities.

Brooks Newmark: It is impractical.

Stella Creasy: The hon. Member for Braintree says, from a sedentary position, that that is not practical. I think that he is thinking purely about the trader and not the consumer. Surely it is impractical for consumers that we do not give them clarity about what constitutes a reasonable time, and that we do not give them the flexibility to negotiate with a trader for a longer repair period if they wish. Indeed, it is impractical for them, as a consequence of the delay because the trader is not able to respond in an appropriate time, that they have to live without a washing machine for a month. There is some concern there. I can see that the hon. Gentleman is vexed.

Brooks Newmark: I can see that the Chair is itching to get this clause wrapped up too. I want to get it wrapped up, because we seem to be going around circular arguments here, but the whole point of today’s debate, and I think it has been extremely healthy, is that it is about what it says on the tin—a Consumer Rights Bill. I support the spirit in which the hon. Lady has put her proposals, but one has to look at the matter from the other side of the equation. There is not always malicious intent from the supplier and there is nothing in the amendment that shows some reasonableness about the fact that sometimes suppliers cannot deliver what she might want. That is the failure in the amendment. One half of the equation is great, but I fear that the other half is just not working, which is why I will certainly oppose the proposal and I hope that all Government Members will do so.

Stella Creasy: I am sure that the hon. Gentleman will get his reasonable request listened to. I say to him that there is an inconsistency in the Bill. We have been trying to tease out this afternoon why some concepts of reasonableness need a specific number attached to them and others do not. It does not bear scrutiny to argue that it is reasonable within 30 days to have spotted a fault, but it is not reasonable within 30 days to expect something to be repaired or, indeed, to get one’s money back. There is no consistency across the piece and I say to the Government that, by opening that door and allowing one time frame in the Bill, they are opening up some uncertainties and inconsistencies because of retaining the concept of reasonableness. I fear that that will be to the detriment of the consumer.
I drew to the attention of the hon. Member for Braintree that the measure is a Consumer Rights Bill; it is about the impact on the individual who is seeking redress. It is not about the trader and whether they are capable of running an effective supply chain, which I am sure he would want to see every trader doing.

Oliver Colvile: My argument is that tenants should also be seen as consumers. That is why they should be incorporated in this activity too.

Stella Creasy: I am delighted to hear the hon. Gentleman say that and I shall expect his support for some of the amendments that we have tabled precisely to be clear that, in these sorts of instances, when people are paying for a business, which the Bill defines as including local or public authorities, they should expect similar rights and should not just have to put up with things in the way we are perhaps asking traders to do now.

Fiona O'Donnell: I am grateful for the opportunity to contribute. We have seen some interesting developments in the debate on these amendments. The hon. Member for Braintree showed that the laissez-faire wing of the Conservative party is still alive and well. I cannot help wondering what tussles took place during the formulating of the Bill, and how the Liberal Democrats might have mitigated what could have been a far worse measure. I will give the Minister some credit; I can see that she has probably fought some battles to introduce the Bill in its current form.

Laura Sandys: I have great respect for our Liberal Democrat partners—[ Interruption. ] Seriously, I do, but both parties have a clear commitment to the consumer. Actually, the Conservative party has a long tradition on consumer rights and consumer issues. On a personal level, I am the only Member of Parliament who has worked for the Consumers Association. I would like to ensure that it is on the record that the Conservative party has a clear tradition on consumer issues.

Fiona O'Donnell: As long as that consumer does not happen to be the consumer of a payday loan. At times, this Government have been slow, at best, to pick up on consumer rights, especially those of the most vulnerable in society.

Brooks Newmark: I might even agree with what the hon. Lady is saying, but the Labour Government had 13 years to clear up the sort of issue that she is now raising.

Fiona O'Donnell: I assure the hon. Gentleman that in our next 13 years in government, we will be far more active on that issue, because I will be there ensuring that we are. Unfortunately, I was not there for the previous 13.

Oliver Colvile: If the hon. Lady gets into power, does her commitment also include ruining the economy of our country and our public finances?

Fiona O'Donnell: If I were a consumer of such views, I would have the right to ask for a repair of what the hon. Gentleman just said. All powerful as he may think that the previous Prime Minister, my right hon. Friend the Member for Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath (Mr Brown) was, he did not have the ability to cause a global recession. He was and still is a man of considerable powers, but that is a ridiculous claim. Cheap points like that while I am trying to make a serious case for the consumer are not appreciated.
Returning to the proposal made by the hon. Member for Braintree, he said that a supplier’s difficulty might not be malicious and that they might not be able to supply a part in time. I absolutely acknowledge that, but ultimately, that still leaves the consumer with a problem, and at times a serious one. I absolutely believe that reasonableness can be catered for in the scope of these amendments. When my washing machine broke down when I had four young children, and the video recorder also broke down, I did not expect the speedy repair of the video. When the engineer came and it turned out that one of my children had put a toothbrush in the video machine, I was certainly glad that I had not pressed in angrier tones for a repair. We can go on about the difficulties and challenges, but ultimately, if a consumer is left without the goods or services that they paid for in good faith, we in this place must stand up for that consumer.

Andrew McDonald: My hon. Friend is making an excellent point. Does she agree that it is a slightly ridiculous extension to suggest that we should approach legislation in such a way that it would not apply if the trader was really nice and had no malicious intent? There are no words in the Bill to say that that should be an exemption from statutory provision. We cannot run the world in that way. It would be nonsense.

Fiona O'Donnell: I thank my hon. Friend for that insightful contribution to the debate. To set our sights on consumer rights by saying, “This is the worst possible circumstance that we can imagine for the provider of goods or services, so let’s build consumer rights that don’t inconvenience that person”, shows a lack of ambition.
We have discussed the consumer having to make faulty goods available for collection or return to the supplier, but in the case of repairs, what does the Minister think are reasonable terms for a consumer to make themselves available to the person who needs to carry out the repair? People in our line of work know that it is extremely difficult to make ourselves available for someone to come to our home to repair goods—that is certainly the case with the Whips in Scotland. There are constraints on how available people in employment can make themselves.
If the person who is supposed to carry out the repair does not turn up, or cannot carry out the repair the first time, the consumer will have already taken a day off work, and they may have promised to serve on five Bill Committees just to keep the Whip happy so that they could be available for said repair. Is it reasonable to think that they should make themselves available on another day, especially in the days of zero-hours contracts and the erosion of workers’ rights? If we are all going to make extravagant claims about the Opposition or the Government, I am going to indulge in that as well. I believe that is an unreasonable request to make of a consumer. We have to get some balance.
We can all try to imagine the worst possible circumstances for suppliers of goods and services, but that should not be the threshold at which we set consumer rights in this day and age. A consumer, especially a vulnerable consumer, should not have to wait more than 30 days, which is the generous term in the amendments tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Walthamstow. When we live in such complex times, the consumer has to have some rights. I look forward to the Minister’s response.

Sheila Gilmore: From listening to many of the exchanges that we have heard, it seems to me that we have lost track of part of what the Bill is about. When someone purchases goods from a retailer and there is a consumer transaction, they expect the goods not to be faulty. That is what consumer protection law is all about. We have covered various consumer provisions at some length, one of which relates to the question of repair instead of replacement. That has been a difficult issue for many years and causes a lot of the consumer disputes that arise.
The length of time allowed is extremely relevant, and the situation is not necessarily the same as when people need repairs to goods that they have had for some considerable time, when there is no concept of fault. We are talking about something brand new that someone has purchased, perhaps white goods such as a washing machine. They expect that washing machine to work, and if it is to be repaired, they expect it to be repaired within a reasonable time. If it is not, it is obvious to me that it should be replaced. It is not unreasonable even for small retailers to do that. Indeed, I suspect that sometimes these days, when people take goods back for repair they actually get a replacement, because what is needed to repair them is not available.
A person should not have to wait long for something to be repaired, unless they have agreed to it. Some items are so special that alternatives are not easily obtained, and the retailer might explain, “I’m really sorry, but we’re not going to be able to do this, because we know from experience that the parts take a long time to come”. The consumer might agree to that, because they want to obtain that particular product. For everyday, normal items that do not have that special quality, we should expect a repair to be done within a defined period because there could be a lot of dispute about what is reasonable and what is unreasonable. What is reasonable to one person is often not reasonable to others. As I think was said in an earlier debate, the courts wrestle constantly with the concept of reasonableness, which is in a lot of legislation, but most of us here are intent on making it possible for people to resolve their disputes easily without recourse to a complex interpretation of the meaning of “reasonable.” Waiting and waiting for someone to do what they should do is not acceptable.
I concur with some of the other things that have been said. It is easy constantly to give examples of retailers who go above and beyond and who, of course, do not want to risk reputational damage by being difficult or tardy in dealing with such things. Of course there are such retailers, which are important because they help to bring everyone up to the same level. If all we needed to do was rely on people who provide a good service and who are helpful to the consumer to bring the entire retail world up to scratch, we would need hardly any consumer legislation.
That prompts the question of why various other bits are included if we can just sit back and say, “It will happen anyway because people won’t want to risk reputational damage or to lose their customers.” That is important, and I think most retailers—certainly the ones that have been around a long time and that want to retain their customers—know that the word of an unhappy customer is important. Some firms do things that they do not have to do because they would rather give someone a quick refund, repair, or whatever it is, than risk that person going away and telling all their friends and neighbours, “I wouldn’t go back there again because they gave me such bad service.” We listen to other people when they tell us such things, and we probably steer clear of places, perhaps unfairly, because someone had a bad experience years ago.
In most circumstances, the kinds of things that we are talking about seem to be reasonable. If a repair cannot be effected within a 30-day period, it would be reasonable for someone to have a new replacement, unless they want to make a particular arrangement because, in order to get the specific item that they really want, they are willing to wait longer. On that basis, I hope the amendment will be supported.

Mark Durkan: It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship this afternoon, Mr Amess. It is important to bear in mind not just the case that has been made for the amendments, which are supported by organisations such as Citizens Advice that deal with consumer problems, but the arguments against the amendments.
The hon. Member for Stevenage makes a fair point in highlighting the risk of 30 days becoming the going rate in all circumstances in which it would be reasonable for something to be done much sooner. The amendments clearly allow for the trader and the consumer to agree a period other than 30 days as being a reasonable period. Sometimes that can be less, and sometimes it can be more. The test of reasonableness, taking account of all the circumstances for the trader and the consumer, still applies anyway. Amendment 21, by creating a 30-day indicator, would not abandon the wider test or application of reasonableness. Obviously, we would have to be careful that the worry expressed by the hon. Gentleman did not come to pass and the limit was deemed to be 30 days and only 30 days.
Other arguments against the amendments have included those from the hon. Member for Braintree, who at one point said that in the real world we cannot legislate on such matters. That is as much an argument against the clause and other parts of the Bill as it is against the amendments—some of the examples he raised would as much be arguments against the feasibility of translating the intent of the clause into practical realisation.
I want to raise a particular issue with the Minister. The clause applies if
“the consumer has the right to repair or replacement”
under clause 19(3) and (4). Those subsections refer us back to clauses 9, 10, 11, 13 and 14, so clause 23 brings us back to other issues in the Bill about whether goods are satisfactory for the purpose for which they are intended and for which it was clear that the consumer intended those purchases.
I represent the city of Derry, also known as Londonderry and as the UK’s first city of culture—it was not succeeded by Southend, for which you have my sympathy, Mr Amess. It is a border constituency. Consumers there buying televisions often want to buy a modern television that gives them access not just to Freeview channels but to SAORVIEW, to allow them to watch RTE, TV3 and other channels available on SAORVIEW in the Irish Republic. When people go into some shops there are little signs saying whether the TVs are SAORVIEW compatible, but other shops do not do that. Customers ask about it, but there have been a number of instances of people who have bought a particular model of TV on the assurance of the person in the shop that it is SAORVIEW compatible only to find that it is not. When they have sought to take the issue up, they have been told that that was not the basis on which the product was sold—that it was not advertised as SAORVIEW compatible and there were no signs in the shop. In other cases, the person in the shop has said, “That TV is meant to be SAORVIEW compatible, so it must be a fault, and we will repair it”, but in practice the model is not compatible.
Sometimes, the situation is something in between, as the TV can pick up the sound from the SAORVIEW service but not the pictures. People have been told that that means that they are getting SAORVIEW, because it includes all the radio stations that are in the SAORVIEW package in the south, but they are not getting the SAORVIEW pictures. They can get the Freeview channels, but those people have bought that particular TV in order to get SAORVIEW.
On repair and replacement, then, bearing in mind that the Bill refers us back to previous clauses that deal with whether goods are fit for the purpose for which they were purchased, will the Minister clarify what rights apply in those circumstances? This is particularly important with regard to replacement; if the replacement is an identical model that is not capable of fulfilling the purpose of receiving SAORVIEW programmes alongside Freeview programmes, where would those issues arise and where would they be addressed?
In those circumstances, the traders will of course say that they have to check with other people and with the firms. They have sometimes implied that there is a fault —they believe—with the TV and that it was not mis-sold. At other times they say that the mistake was really made on the part of the purchaser, and that they never claimed that the TV had SAORVIEW either. In such circumstances, introducing a definite back-stop timeline to the question of what is to happen would certainly help consumers in the confused twilight zone situation that there is for people who buy goods in border constituencies.
In this instance, I have spoken only of the issues arising for my constituents buying their TVs in my constituency to be watched in Northern Ireland on our side of the border. Of course, there are consumers buying their TVs to watch over the border, in the neighbouring county of Donegal, and I do not expect the Minister to answer fully all those questions. However, I just want to point out to the Committee that when we are looking at where consumer rights apply and how they can be interpreted and measured, some of us have to look at a variety of other issues, alongside all the wonderful examples of lifts in various parts of the country and other concerns that have entertained us this afternoon.

Jennifer Willott: This has been a long and lively debate—longer and livelier than perhaps some of us were expecting in the beginning.
I acknowledge that a minority of consumers may become extremely frustrated by the length of time it takes to repair or replace items. The examples we have heard today, such as broken washing machines and piles of dirty clothes, make a real difference to everyday life and are important to fix.
As I have said in previous debates, the limit of one repair or one replacement already addresses the risk that consumers may become trapped in a cycle of failed repairs to goods, going round and round trying to get a resolution. [Interruption.] A washing machine would indeed go round and round, unless it is waiting to be fixed. There is little evidence that the time taken for repairs is a common problem. It does not mean that it is not a problem, but it is not a common problem. A recent consumer detriment survey found that, of the consumers who experienced a problem, only 4% had a problem with a failed or delayed repair. Therefore, a delayed repair affects fewer than 4% of the consumers surveyed. The delay in people getting their repairs back is not an enormous problem, even though, clearly, it is an issue for those affected.
Before I respond to the specific issues raised by the amendment, let me just say that BIS has considered how a time limit might operate; it was one of the things we looked at. There was a consultation in 2012, and we have discussed and explored the issue with stakeholders since then. The Government concluded that the best approach remains a simple limit of one repair or replacement of goods, which must be provided—this is important—within a reasonable time and without significant inconvenience to the consumer. That wording is important in respect of a number of the points raised by hon. Members this afternoon.
The consumer must not suffer significant inconvenience as a result of the repair or replacement. If a consumer experiences a problem because of the delay in repairing the goods, it is likely that the tests of significant inconvenience and reasonable time will be breached. If the process was going on for a while, those two key standards would be breached. If the process is causing inconvenience, compensation is provided for in the Bill. Consumers could get either a price reduction or a refund under the Bill. That would tackle a lot of the issues that hon. Members have raised today. It is also clear in the Bill that a consumer can seek damages in addition to the statutory remedies, so the consumer could ask for compensation via that route as well if significant problems had been caused. A lot of the issues raised today, such as waiting for a washing machine to be repaired, would be covered by those measures.
The hon. Member for East Lothian talked about the issue of making goods available for repair. The trader is obliged to repair goods within a reasonable time and without significant inconvenience to the consumer. A trader failing to turn up when the consumer has made particular arrangements to be there is likely to have breached the requirements, and that triggers the remedies that are available. So quite a few of the concerns raised would be covered.
A fixed time period for repairs or replacements could be problematic for reasons that my hon. Friend the Member for Braintree ably laid out. A reasonable time may for very good reasons be different for different products. We can go back to the comparison between the kettle in our first debate and the sofa that we have been debating today. A reasonable period in which to replace a kettle would be far shorter than the period for a hand-made bespoke sofa transported halfway around the world. What would be reasonable in both those circumstances would be very different. A one-size-fits-all approach would not be appropriate and might lead to unintended consequences.

Andrew McDonald: The Minister has highlighted the difference between types of goods and the expectations in respect of different goods, but when the goods are the same, the only thing that is different is the trader. Should there be consistency?

Jennifer Willott: It may well be that there would be consistency in the way that a trader deals with a particular problem. However, if a trader was not treating someone fairly and the length of time that it was taking was not reasonable and caused significant inconvenience to the customer, the trader would be in breach of the measures in the Bill. So protection is already built into the Bill.
On the unwanted consequences of having a one-size-fits-all approach, first and most importantly, with the majority of repairs or replacements—this is one of the points raised a number of times by my hon. Friend the Member for Braintree—some factors are beyond the control of the trader, so a fixed time limit may impose a significant burden in some circumstances. Very few repairs are actually carried out by the trader themselves.
If someone takes their jumper with the hole in it back to the shop—to go back to another example—the girl behind the counter is extremely unlikely to be the person who sews up the hole. Often, goods need to be transported to and from somebody who can repair them. If parts are out of stock and have to be ordered in, it takes time. It can take weeks if the parts are being transported by sea from abroad. As in the previous debate, we are talking about a very wide range of goods, and it might be that in some cases a much longer period would be considered reasonable.
Businesses have highlighted how in certain circumstances compliance could be problematic. Although some goods could easily be repaired within a significantly shorter period than 30 days, in some cases the supply chain would have to be involved and the trader simply could not comply. An example would be complex hand-made bespoke items such as a sofa made in Italy or Hong Kong, or perhaps a beautiful Italian sofa such as the hon. Member for East Lothian has with her scatter cushions on it. In such cases, repairs are likely to take longer than 30 days. If they do, the trader is likely to always be in breach of their obligations under the amendment. The most obvious course of action for the trader is to not sell such goods any more, because it is not in their interests. More likely, they would withdraw the products from sale, which would not be to the benefit of consumers.
I am also concerned about the implications and the burdens for small businesses. I know that the Opposition are concerned about the Bill’s implications for small businesses, and the subject has been raised several times. Amendment 21 would be a negative step for such businesses. When the British Retail Consortium gave evidence to the Committee, it said that setting a deadline for repairs was
“more difficult for the small and mediums, because they cannot have control over third parties that are perhaps coming in to do the repair…If that was regulated, clearly that would be one-size-fits-all, and would, I fear, penalise small, medium-sized and micro-businesses.”––[Official Report, Consumer Rights Public Bill Committee, 11 February 2014; c. 33, Q70.]
Clearly, we do not want to do that. The process of diagnosing a fault, attempting a fix and testing it can be complex, depending on the item, which adds to the time taken.
Another factor that affects how long a repair takes is the consumer’s availability, as the hon. Member for East Lothian has mentioned. A consumer’s availability might affect the time scale and make it difficult for a business to estimate whether they can meet the time limit. If a consumer has strict work patterns and limited flexibility, they might be available for a repair in their home for only two days during that 30-day period. There may be good reasons for that, but most people would agree that in those circumstances it would not be fair to penalise the trader. In view of such factors, we believe that a fixed time scale does not allow the flexibility necessary to work with all types of goods and cover all likely circumstances.
Similar flexibility is required for replacements, depending on the stock, the source and whether the goods were bespoke. Replacing a kettle is likely to be far quicker than replacing a bespoke floor or a handmade sofa, for example. We do not believe that simply providing for an alternative time scale to be agreed beforehand will adequately address the need for flexibility, because a trader will not always be able to predict at the start of a job how long it will take. The amendment would not provide enough flexibility.
We are also concerned that the imposition of a time limit may lead to a reduction in the quality of repairs. If a trader cannot do a full and proper repair within the time limit, they might feel pressurised to do a rush job to get it done within 30 days rather than taking the time to get it right. That is clearly not in the best interests of consumers. Such a measure might undermine faith in repairs and lead to an increase in rejected goods, which is wasteful and costly.
As hon. Members have said, we are concerned that if we set a time limit, it would become the default and would displace the requirement for a repair or replacement to be provided in a reasonable time. For many items, a reasonable time is currently far less than 30 days, so many consumers would suffer detriment if 30 days came to be seen as a reasonable period.
Amendment 22 is designed to clarify how the requirements for a repair or replacement to be completed within a reasonable time and without inconvenience interact with the 30-day time limit for repairs. If a repair or replacement had taken longer than 30 days, the amendment would require an assessment of whether the process had taken an unreasonably long time or caused the consumer significant inconvenience, to take into account the financial impact on the consumer. We do not believe that the amendment is necessary. The existing provision is already broad, and a decision on whether a consumer has suffered significant inconvenience must take into account the nature and the purpose of the goods rather than whether a repair or replacement has taken longer than 30 days. That requirement catches all the relevant factors.
I would also like to make it clear that, as I think I said earlier, a consumer can claim damages for any additional loss suffered as a result of the faulty good. For example, if the washing machine belonging to the hon. Member for East Lothian was broken and she was doing four children’s-worth of dirty clothes, she could claim damages for the cost of doing her washing in a launderette while the washing machine was being repaired. The additional costs associated with the inconvenience and getting something repaired can be claimed through the damages process.
I do not think that Members have touched on amendment 34 very much, but it concerns digital content and would establish a time limit within which traders must complete repairs or provide a replacement for faulty digital content. Such content differs from goods in some important ways that ultimately affect the remedies on offer. Complex forms of digital content, such as games and software, are almost impossible to release without some bugs in the underlying code. That is considered an acceptable feature of the digital content market. When Which? gave evidence to the Business, Innovation and Skills Committee during pre-legislative scrutiny of the Bill, its representative said:
“Consumers are very accepting of updates and patches within the software development world and when purchasing apps…In any given situation, you would be able to tell the difference between a faulty piece of software and one that is just evolving.”
The digital market is very different from when someone just purchases a good that is either okay or not, so we do not think it is appropriate to enforce strict limits on the number of repairs and replacements that are allowed for digital content—for example, upgrades are a regular part of digital content. However, the protections are the same. Repairs and replacements must be conducted in the same way as with goods: within a reasonable time and without significant inconvenience to the consumer. Such protections are built in.
The digital market is a good example of where a 30-day limit would often be completely inappropriate. If a download can be repeated immediately, there is absolutely no need for someone to wait 30 days to download a film that did not download properly the first time. Imposing a 30-day limit in such circumstances could be quite detrimental to consumers.
We will probably discuss the issues relating to digital content in more depth when we examine the relevant part of the Bill, but I hope that I have explained why the Government have concerns about introducing quite such a rigid 30-day time limit. I also hope that I have reassured Members that significant protections are already built into the Bill to ensure that repairs and replacements are carried out in an appropriate time frame, and that a route is available for compensation if people find themselves disadvantaged.

Fiona O'Donnell: I have been thinking about the circumstances in which the Minister said I could have claimed damages for the cost of my washing. I was not a driver, and living in a village in remote Oxfordshire with no dry cleaner or laundry service, what she suggested would have been of absolutely no help to me whatever. However, putting more pressure on the supplier of the washing machine to repair it quickly would have been of help.

Jennifer Willott: I think that the hon. Lady missed my earlier comments relating to that issue. Traders will be required to do repairs or provide a replacement
“within a reasonable time and without significant inconvenience to the consumer”.
That restriction is already in the Bill. What would be considered a reasonable time frame would vary for different goods. It would probably not be reasonable to leave someone without a washing machine for a month, whereas if the item was hand-made and bespoke and had to be sent to the other side of the world to be fixed, a month or more would probably be considered reasonable. The hon. Lady’s concerns are perfectly fair, and they are covered by the Bill.
Before I conclude, I want to come to the hon. Member for Foyle and his televisions. If a trader sold a television and told the consumer, made it clear, or a label on it said, that it was Freeview and Saorview compatible, but it turned out not to be compatible on the other side of the border, it would not be what the consumer paid for. If a repair or a replacement were possible, that would be great and would sort it out. If it could not be corrected by doing that, the consumer could, at that point, get a price reduction or refund depending on the situation. If they had made it clear when they had bought the television that they wanted it because it was Saorview compatible, or if it was in the shop with a label on it saying that it was, or if the trader said that it was, it would be covered by the Bill’s provisions. I hope that reassures his constituents that they will get to watch the telly that they need. With that, I hope I have reassured hon. Members, and I ask the hon. Member for Walthamstow to withdraw her amendments.

Stella Creasy: I thank the Minister for her comments. This afternoon’s debate has flagged up the question of what is “reasonable” and what is “inconvenience”. Those terms appear a number of times throughout the legislation but at a crucial point in it, they are specified. For consumers—this afternoon’s debate has teased this out well—that could be confusing rather than illuminating. If they have a time limit in some areas and not in others, what represents a significant inconvenience will be a shorter time frame for some than it is for others. Some traders may seek to press what is a reasonable time period, and others will not.
I want to pick up a couple of points that the Minister made about that, because it is important for the record that we can return to them. She talked about the possibility that a time limit would lead to repairs being a rush job. That would surely lead to the consumer having the right to reject the good, because the whole point is that it was faulty in the first place, so the idea that we should indulge traders who cannot get it together to fix things in 30 days, and then do a bad job to get out of it, does not seem to hold water.
The Minister mentioned that the amendment is about digital content, and yes, I thought we would come on that at a later date. However, I point out to her that there are certainly examples of digital content that people would expect to get. I am sure that she did not have the misfortune to try to download Google Maps when it first turned up. That was a disaster for many of us. Consumers are right to expect a repair to that and for it to be updated. That it was not done as quickly as one would perhaps have expected caused problems for consumers. The idea that we would not have expectations about digital content in the same way as we would about other goods and services is a timely reminder that although digital content has different qualities, and although there are different expectations about whether it should be good from the get-go and when faults are identified, that does not necessarily mean that we should be complacent about addressing it.

Jennifer Willott: Let me clarify: I am not suggesting that people do not have the right to digital content without faults, and clearly the example of Google Maps is a good one. However, we will discuss the issue in depth later. My comment was aimed at identifying the fact that it is a different market, and there are different expectations on the consumer’s side about quality, patching and repairing, updates and so on, which do not apply to material goods.

Stella Creasy: I do not disagree with the Minister, but the point remains that there is rightly a distinction to be made between, on one hand, a good that is faulty offline or content that is faulty online, as Google Maps was, and on the other hand the recognition among consumers that they might choose to upgrade their iPhone 5S or iPhone 5C, for example. It is important in how we approach issues about simplifying consumer rights that we do not somehow presume that digital content is so special that people expect it to be permanently in a beta mode, so that some of the basic provisions in law are not applied to it.
I caution the Minister about thinking that there is no reason to delay downloading. For example, if someone had tried to download films that they wanted to take on holiday, and then they discovered when they got abroad that they could not access the content on their iPad or Kindle, it might well be another 30 days, or a reasonable amount of time, before they got back and could fix it. There is sometimes a presumption, when it comes to digital content, that somehow, like the internet, it is such a wonderful new and wild world that all the rules and expectations about how everybody lives their lives and interacts do not apply. The debate will develop further on Thursday, but it is worth putting on record that today’s debates have been about teasing out some of the inconsistencies. We reserve the right to return on Report to the issue of opening the door to 30-day or other time frames for some elements of the Bill. We should consider what that means for consumers, who should be able to use consistent rights. With that in mind, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Stella Creasy: I beg to move amendment 23, in clause23,page14,line32,at end add—
‘(9) Where the quality of provision of goods has been deemed to be hazardous or so poor as to cause the consumer to reasonably lose confidence in the traders’ ability to provide goods, the consumer may refuse a repair and exercise their right to reject under section 20.’.
The amendment will be eerily familiar to the Committee, because it is about being able to refuse a repair and get money back in certain circumstances. We talked earlier today about the possibility that there could be traders whose behaviour is so calamitous that the idea of people going to them to seek a repair before getting their money back is not fair. The amendment would ensure that in some specific circumstances, a consumer may refuse a repair and request a refund.
The provision is designed to cover situations in which a good has been provided in such a way as to cause the consumer to fear risks to life and limb. Our proposals mean that the consumer would not then have to give the trader the opportunity to repair and so come into further contact. Instead, the consumer could secure a refund. That would cover instances beyond the 30-day time period when a consumer discovers that there is such a fault, but it might not cover the case of the faulty sofa. I accept, however, that if the legs of the faulty sofa broke and my hon. Friend the Member for East Lothian was thrown off, doing damage to her back, that would be upsetting.
With a gas cooker that turns out to be leaking, however, it is not a good idea to have to get a company that sold me such a cooker to fix it, when it might have blown up my house. I have cause to believe that the company sold me such a faulty good that it put my life and limb at risk. It is right that there should be circumstances in which traders can be held to account so that consumers are not required to go back to them and may simply get their money back. That is why we tabled the amendment.

Mary Glindon: Having spoken about wedding dresses this afternoon, I now want to illustrate the issue with a sad story about an engagement ring—my own engagement ring. I was happily engaged in 1998 and had a pretty ring with three diamonds. One diamond had come out before I got married in 2000—the centre diamond, which had to be replaced—and two years later, when we were going on holiday, I lost that diamond again. It had to be replaced, fortunately under warranty, but between then and 2011 the other two diamonds came out and I had to pay for them to be replaced. By that time, I had paid more for the replacements than the £500 I had paid for the ring back in 1998.
I asked the jeweller—Goldsmiths, just to tell everyone as a warning—whether the ring could be reset. The people there said that that could be done. Happily, I thought that was great, and I met the jeweller, who showed how he could make the stones more secure, and I agreed a price. When I went to collect the ring, which I thought was to be reset, it was actually a completely new ring. They had traded in the gold of my old ring. I was rather disappointed not to have any part of my original engagement ring—as women know, it is an item of sentimental value—but subsequently I was quite happy. There were the two original stones—I had actually had to replace another stone—one new stone and a new gold band.
All that cost me about £1,500, but I felt that at last I had a ring that would see me to the end of my days, only to find out within a few weeks that that was not to be. I was going into a shop and pushing the door open, but, lo and behold, no stone. By that time, I had lost all faith in Goldsmiths. Over a number of years, various stones had been replaced in the original ring, and this was a new ring. The people at Goldsmiths offered to repair it, but I had to say that I had no faith in them. The amendment would cover that situation. The long and short of it is that I refused to have the ring back. They gave me the value of the ring, plus the two stones, and I had to get another ring, which has been okay, but it is a sad tale. I had no confidence in that company, and I did not want the ring replaced or to spend another 10 years of my life going back and forward to have diamonds put in it. I was not able to get away from the company completely, but today things are okay. People may think that I had a materialistic attitude, but an engagement ring is an important thing. That is why the clause is important.

Jennifer Willott: First, I have huge sympathy for consumers who find that the goods they have bought are dangerous. Clearly, we do not want to be in that position or the position that the hon. Member for North Tyneside highlighted. I completely understand where she is coming from. An engagement ring is precious; it is worth much more than the value of the gold and diamonds in it.
The Department for Business, Innovation and Skills consulted in 2012 on whether an exception should be made when goods are found to be dangerous due to a fault. However, in response to the consultation, the Department received strong representations arguing against that approach. Such faults are often easily and cheaply rectified, so allowing an immediate jump to the right to reject could be seen as disproportionate. For example, the Retail Motor Industry Federation gave the example of faulty brake pads, which can clearly cause a vehicle to be extremely dangerous. However, it argued that brake pads can be easily fixed, so it would be disproportionate for consumers to have an automatic right to move directly to a second-tier remedy.

Andrew McDonald: That worries me slightly. If a person has an issue with their brake pads, it is not unreasonable for them to approach someone different. I had a similar problem with a gas cooker, which I discovered had not been properly connected. It had been done with grease, which would degrade over time. I was not happy with the fitter coming back to repair the gas cooker—I would fear for his safety if he set foot across my threshold.

Jennifer Willott: I will come to the hon. Gentleman’s point, because there are different issues bound up in this. There are cases in which something that can be considered dangerous can be easily fixed. His example of his gas cooker raises the issue of faith in a particular tradesman. That relates to the second part of the amendment, which I will come to in a moment when I address the point raised by the hon. Member for North Tyneside. There are cases in which something that is dangerous is cheap and easy to fix. A car’s brake pads can be changed quickly and easily, and many people would think that to allow a person immediately to reject a brand new car that was extremely valuable but has lost a lot of value as a result of being driven off the forecourt would be disproportionate, depending on what the fault was.
If it is impossible for the trader to repair the item or provide a replacement, the Bill already allows the consumer to move directly to the second-tier remedies—the final right to reject or a reduction in the purchase price. If it is possible for the trader to repair the item or provide a replacement, I am not sure why the consumer would not want that. There are many cases where that is what they would want.
As an aside, another issue that the 2012 consultation highlighted was the difficulty of defining what counts as dangerous or hazardous. There is a clear risk that that could be an additional source of dispute between the consumer and the trader, which would also muddy the waters. The most important point is that the consumer has access to a remedy that effectively addresses the fault, whether it is dangerous or not. In many cases, a repair or a replacement will help the consumer and the business achieve what they want.
There will be cases, however, as the hon. Members for Middlesbrough and for North Tyneside mentioned, where the relationship between the consumer and the trader has completely broken down. I am aware that they are also concerned about the dangerous nature of the goods. In those circumstances, the Bill does not require the consumer to submit to a repair. It retains the existing right for the consumer to seek damages from the trader instead. In the interests of clarity, it clearly states that the consumer has that alternative alongside the other remedies in the Bill.

Fiona O'Donnell: Thinking about the consumer’s experience, how will the consumer progress that matter? Will they ask for damages? How will that be enforced?

Jennifer Willott: It is an existing right under existing legislation that people have the right to pursue damages through the courts. The consumer can either take the route that they are happy to have a repair, or if they are not, they can pursue damages. The hon. Member for North Tyneside highlighted the case of her ring, which she had repaired a number of times, with problems every time. She would have far more protections under the Bill than there are currently. She would only have to have one replacement or repair before she would have the right to reject those options and get her money back if the replacement or repair did not work.
I have clarified that consumers will not be required to submit to a repair. If the relationship has broken down or they are concerned about dangerous goods, there is an alternative route. In many cases, having a repair or replacement will be the most effective way of resolving the problem, so I hope the hon. Member for Walthamstow will withdraw her amendment.

Stella Creasy: Perhaps the Minister did not grasp the severity of the issue. I have had experience of a trader who has put me at risk, similar to the experience of my hon. Friend the Member for Middlesbrough with the gas fitter using grease. The idea that the only alternative available is to go to court is worrying for us. The consumer might want to report them to the police. In my case someone put bubblegum underneath my car to fix the exhaust.
We have listened to what the Minister has said and we might return to the issue on Report. Where traders are so egregious, it is right to offer consumers the added protection of an intermediate level between having to go to court to get money back and having to suffer a continuing relationship with someone who has put their life and limb at risk. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Clause 23 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Ordered, That further consideration be now adjourned. —(Mr Gyimah.)

Adjourned till Thursday 27 February at half-past Eleven o’clock.
Written evidence reported to the House
CR 09 Confederation of British Industry
CR 10 Glass and Glazing Federation (GGF)
CR 11 Mobile Broadband Group
CR 12 British Bankers Association
CR 13 Advertising Standards Authority
CR 14 Alan Moss
CR 15 UK Interactive Entertainment
CR 16 National Franchised Dealers Association (NFDA)
CR 17 Symantec
CR 18 U.S. Chamber Institute for Legal Reform
CR 19 Microsoft Ltd
CR 20 techUK